Incidence, prevalence and clinical manifestations at onset of juvenile diabetes in Tanzania

Better knowledge on incidence, prevalence and clinical manifestations is needed for planning diabetes care in Sub Saharan Africa. Aims: To find a crude incidence/prevalence of diabetes in children and young adults in a low resource setting, classify the diabetes and audit the health record keeping. Methods: A retrospective observational study based on medical recordings 2010–2016. Target population was children and adolescent registered in Changing Diabetes in Children (CDiC) or Life for a Child (LFAC) programs for children with T1DM and diagnosed at 5 diabetes clinics in three geographical regions of Tanzania. 604 patients’ files were available from five hospitals. Results: 336/604 files covered patients <15 years of age at diagnosis. The prevalence of diabetes <15 years of age ranged from 10.1 to 11.9 per 100,000 children and the annual incidence 1.8–1.9/100,000 children, with peak incidence at 10–14 years. A lot of data were missing. The great majority of the patients presented with typical signs and symptoms of T1D, 83.7% with plausible ketoacidosis (DKA). Conclusions: Diabetes incidence and prevalence is still low. T1D seems to dominate with very high frequency of DKA at diagnosis. Increased awareness of diabetes both in health care and community is needed.