American Diabetic Patients Expected to Double

A new study estimates that Americans suffering with diabetes could increase dramatically over the next quarter of the century. This would lead to the cost of healthcare increasing to a whopping $336 billion, triple the current levels.

Dr. Elbert S. Huang from the Department of Medicine at the University of Chicago, Illinois, did the study together with colleagues. A writeup on the study is featured in the Diabetes Care magazine December issue.

The research team developed a ‘Markov model’. The model of diabetes costs took into consideration a few trends left out by models developed previously. These include natural history of the condition, risk factors, and the effects of the treatments.

Changes in the diabetes population over time, baby boomer effect, recent surges in the US obesity rates, and the development of complications that affect the eyes, kidneys, circulation, and nervous system were also considered while carrying out this study.

Markov modeling is increasingly integrated into tools that attempt to forecast complex systems’ behavior in the future. These range from the study of diseases to reliability engineering.

The researchers said, “”We built this model to improve the budgetary and health outcome information available to federal policymakers. The model provides a rigorous assessment of the future burden of diabetes that accounts for the natural history of the disease and recent advances in treatment.”

The results showed:

Diagnosed and undiagnosed diabetes will rise from 23.7 to 44.1 million Americans between 2009 and 2034.

65% of people would be obese, with the distribution of obesity in the population remaining the same.

Annual spending on healthcare for diabetes will increase $113 billion to $336 billion between 2009 and 2034.