Type 1 diabetes in Africa: an immunogenetic study in the Amhara of North-West Ethiopia.

ABSTRACT:

Aims/hypothesis

We aimed to characterise the immunogenic background of insulin-dependent diabetes in a resource-poor rural African community. The study was initiated because reports of low autoantibody prevalence and phenotypic differences from European-origin cases with type 1 diabetes have raised doubts as to the role of autoimmunity in this and similar populations.

Methods

A study of consecutive, unselected cases of recently diagnosed, insulin-dependent diabetes (n = 236, ≤35 years) and control participants (n = 200) was carried out in the ethnic Amhara of rural North-West Ethiopia. We assessed their demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, and measured non-fasting C-peptide, diabetes-associated autoantibodies and HLA-DRB1 alleles. Leveraging genome-wide genotyping,

SUBMITTER: Balcha SA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7476916 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature