Evaluation of the relationship between the prealbumin/fibrinogen ratio and diabetic nephropathy in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus

Abstract

<abstract><sec> <title>Introduction</title> <p>Our aim was to compare the prealbumin/fibrinogen ratio (PFR) of diabetic patient populations with or without diabetic nephropathy.</p> </sec><sec> <title>Materials and methods</title> <p>People with type 2 diabetes who attended the internal medicine outpatient clinic were enrolled in the study. Two groups were formed according to the proteinuria of the patients: Diabetic nephropathy and non-nephropathy group. Diabetic nephropathy was calculated using the mathematical formula of spot urine albumin/spot urine creatinine x100. Patients with proteinuria above 200 mg/g were considered to have nephropathy. PFR was simply calculated by dividing prealbumin by fibrinogen.</p> </sec><sec> <title>Results</title> <p>A total of 152 patients who attended our outpatient clinic were enrolled in the study. There were 68 patients in the diabetic nephropathy group and 84 in the non-nephropathy group. The prealbumin/fibrinogen ratios (PFR) were significantly lower in the nephropathic group [0.061 (0.02–0.16)] than the non-nephropathic group [0.0779 (0.01–0.75)] (p = 0.002).</p> </sec><sec> <title>Conclusions</title> <p>We suggest that decreased levels of PFR can indicate diabetic nephropathy in subjects with type 2 diabetes mellitus.</p> </sec></abstract>