Risk Assessment for Diabetes Mellitus by Using Indian Diabetes Risk Score Among Office Workers of Health Institutions of South India

Background: Diabetes mellitus (DM) is one of the non-communicable diseases plaguing the world and contributes a major part to the total disease burden. Diabetes has been prevalent in all countries throughout the years, with the majority of diabetics living in low- and middle-income countries. Madras Diabetes Research Foundation developed the Indian Diabetes Risk Score (IDRS), a simple and cost-effective method to assess the chances of developing diabetes. Objectives: To assess the diabetes risk profile of office workers using IDRS and to determine the proportion of individual risk factors of diabetes among the participants. Methods: This cross sectional study included 94 non-diabetic office workers working in two health care institutions situated in coastal South India. Data was collected by a study questionnaire consisting of three sections. Section A included details related to participant characteristics, Section B included anthropometric measurements, and Section C consisted of the Indian Diabetes Risk Score. The collected data were coded and entered into Statistical Package for Social Sciences. Results: The mean age of the study participants was 40.88 (±9.761) years, and the mean BMI was 23.8 (±3.6) kg/m². Majority (n=65, 67%) of the study participants did not have a family history of diabetes. One-third of the study participants had IDRS ≥ 60, which allocated them in the high risk category for type 2 diabetes (n=34, 35.1%). Conclusion: It has been conclusively shown from the study that most of the office workers have moderate to high risk of developing diabetes and are also overweight or obese.