Diabetes mellitus in Friedreich Ataxia: A case series of 19 patients from the German-Austrian diabetes mellitus registry

Angeliki Pappa, Martin G. Häusler, Andreas Veigel, Konstantina Tzamouranis, Martin W. Pfeifer, Andreas Schmidt, Martin Bökamp, Holger Haberland, Siegfried Wagner, Joachim Brückel, Gideon de Sousa, Lukas Hackl, Esther Bollow, Reinhard W Holl, Diabetes Res Clin Pract. 2018 May 12. pii: S0168-8227(17)32029-6 DOI: 10.1016/j.diabres.2018.05.008

Diabetes phenotype in FRDA is intermediate between type 1 and type 2 diabetes with ketoacidosis being frequent at presentation and blood glucose levels similar to T1Dm but higher than in T2Dm (356 ±165 and 384± 203 mg/dl). 63.2% of FRDA patients received insulin monotherapy, 21% insulin plus oral antidiabetics and 15.8% lifestyle change only, applying similar doses of insulin in all three groups.
FRDADm can be controlled by individualized treatment regimen with insulin or oral antidiabetics. Patients with DM in FRDA may show a relevant risk to ketoacidotic complications, which should be avoided.

 Diabetes mellitus in Friedreich Ataxia: A case series of 19 patients from the German-Austrian diabetes mellitus registry