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Diabetes and MS

I have been reading information on Diabetes and MS being closley linked and that the chance of developing MS is higher in people with diabetis, do anyone have any thoughts on this.
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147426 tn?1317265632
There is a link between having Type I Diabetes (the autoimmune type - typical of children and adolescents) and a three fold higher risk of developing MS.  This does not apply to the more common Type II Diabetes which is characterized by insulin resistance.

Therre is also about a 44% higher risk for close relatives of a person with MS to develop Diabetes Type I.

This higher risk between the two is clearly due to a genetic predisposition.

The info to take away from this is that if you have Type I (only) Diabetes you have about a 1 in 250+ chance of developing MS rather than the national average of 1 in 800.

This is historically kind of interesting, because before a few years ago, it was thought that Type I Diabetes and MS were mutually exclusive because of their associated tissue typing.

Live and learn.

Quix
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Avatar universal
I have had diabetes since I was 13 yrs. old, and was recently diagnosed with MS at 37.  They think I had it 8 yrs. ago, but put the problems I was having in a different category until I recently had a flare up and now they say I have MS.  What a bummer!  I didn't know anything about MS until recently, and now I have two horrible diseases!  I wonder what's next!!
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Avatar universal
thank you for your reply, very interesting, I am type 1 diabetic of 35 years since a child, I am now undergoing MRI scans to try and see if I have any further problems, I have a brigt white spot show up but have not had the spinal cord part of the scan done yet, I hope to have this done soon to see if it shows any signs
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147426 tn?1317265632
I haven't seen data that show that MSers are more likely to develop Type I Diabetes, but then Type I Diabetes is typically developed in childhood, adolescence or very young adulthood, so that statistically the diabetes would be the first thing to show up in a person.

Quix
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1396846 tn?1332459510
I haven't heard any corralation between the two but maybe some others have.

Paula
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