Neuropathy — a result of nerve damage that can cause pain and numbness in hands and feet that can lead to falls, infection and amputation — is underdiagnosed, according to a new report.
The study, published Wednesday in Neurology, included 169 people from an outpatient internal medicine clinic in Flint, MI. The practice serves mostly people using Medicaid.
Participants were 58 years old, on average. Half of participants had diabetes, which is known to cause neuropathy; and 67% had metabolic syndrome (excess belly fat and two or more risk factors such as high blood pressure, high blood sugar, high triglycerides and low levels of high-density lipoprotein cholesterol), which is also a risk factor for neuropathy.
Among the participants, 73% had neuropathy; of them, 75% hadn’t been previously diagnosed with it, the data showed. Among those with neuropathy, 74% had metabolic syndrome. The study didn’t follow up on participants over time, the authors noted.
After investigators adjusted for other factors that could impact the risk of neuropathy, researchers found that people with metabolic syndrome were more than four times more likely to have neuropathy than people who did not have it.
“More than one-third of people with neuropathy experience sharp, prickling or shock-like pain, which increases their rates of depression and decreases quality of life,” Melissa A. Elafros, MD, study author and researcher from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, said in a statement. “People with neuropathy also have an increased risk of earlier death, even when you take into account other conditions they have, so identifying and treating people with or at risk for neuropathy is essential.”
“The amount of people with neuropathy in this study, particularly undiagnosed neuropathy, was extraordinarily high with almost three fourths of the study population,” Elafros said. “This highlights the urgent need for interventions that improve diagnosis and management of this condition, as well as the need for managing risk factors that can lead to this condition.”
