2SSK Şevket Yılmaz Hastanesi Göz Hast. Kliniği, Bursa.
3SSK Şevket Yılmaz Hastanesi Aile Hekimliği, Bursa.
4Marmara Üniversitesi Tıp Fakültesi Endokrinoloji AD., İstanbul, Purpose: Our purpose is to evaluate the relationship between the platelet membrane anionic charge (PAC) and different stages of diabetic retinopathy (DR) in nephropathy-free patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus with the PAC in non-diabetic control subjects.
Materials and Methods: Forty-nine patients with type 2 diabetes attended to the family physician for the first time were included in this study. Depending on the first ophthalmic examination they were divided by the stage of DR into 3 groups: Group A (n=23), those without DR; group B (n=13), those with pre-proliferative DR; and group C (n=13), those with proliferative DR. 38 nondiabetic subjects made up the control group (group D). Platelet anionic charge (PAC) was measured as alcian blue binding to platelets.
Results: The patients with type 2 diabetes had significantly lower levels of platelet anionic charges than the non-diabetic controls (p<0.05). PAC in the patients with proliferative DR were not significantly different from neither that in non-proliferative nor in no DR group.
Conclusion: Our study demonstrated decreased levels of PAC in diabetic patients as compared with non-diabetic controls. There is no relationship between PAC and DR severity.
Keywords : Platelet anionic charge, diabetes mellitus, retinopathy.