People with poorer general psychological well-being have a significantly higher risk of developing type 2
diabetes (T2D) in a dose-response manner regardless of genetic predisposition, the results of a recent study suggest.
A team of researchers conducted this prospective cohort study using the UK Biobank to explore the relationship between combined psychological well-being factors and type 2 diabetes, as well as to determine whether genetic predisposition modified this association.
A total of 127,496 participants who completed a psychological well-being questionnaire and who did not have T2D at baseline (2006-2010) were enrolled in the study. Of these, 88,584 (69.5 percent) were included in the analysis that determined their genetic predisposition. Incident T2D was the primary outcome.
Documented T2D cases totaled 2,547 during a median follow-up of 10.0 years. The risk of diabetes was markedly increased in participants with moderate to extreme unhappiness, satisfaction score ≤3, presence of extensive
depressionor a neuroticism score ≥3.
Considering psychological well-being as a composite indicator, T2D fully adjusted hazard ratios were 1.41 (95 percent confidence interval [CI]1.21-1.65) among individuals in the third quartile of the psychological well-being score, 1.45 (95% CI, 1.24-1.69) in the second quartile, and 1.73 (CI of the 95%, 1.48-2.01) in the lowest quartile compared to those in the highest quartile.
Stratified analysis revealed significant interactions of age (pInteraction<0.001) and physical activity (pInteraction=0.049) with T2D, but there was no significant association between psychological well-being score and genetic susceptibility to diabetes (pInteraction=0.980).
