Introduction

Considering the global surge in the prevalence of diabetes in young adults, the American Diabetes Association (ADA) currently recommends routine screening for type-2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) beginning at the age of 35 years. Studies have indicated that Indians develop diabetes at a younger age. Currently, large-scale studies looking at the prevalence of diabetes in young Indians are limited. Yet, routine screening at an earlier age may be relevant for Indian setting.

Aim

To determine the prevalence of diabetes in young Indians below the age of 35 years.

Profile of the Study Participants

• Participants from the nationwide “Defeat Diabetes Campaign” launched by the “Research Society for the Study of Diabetes in India” (RSSDI) at 10,258 sites in the year 2021 (n=225,955; age: 18-80 years)

Methods

Study Design

• A retrospective analysis.

Evaluations

• The prevalence of diabetes was calculated for young subsets below the age of 35 years.
• The prevalence of diabetes was calculated separately for young subsets below the age of 35 years, below the age of 30 years, and below the age of 25 years.
• The prevalence data was also analyzed among young individuals for age categories: 30–34 years, 25–29 years, and 18–24 years.
• Impact of family history was analyzed by comparing prevalence of diabetes among people with positive and negative family history in different age groups.
• The prevalence of diabetes was also analyzed for people who had not reported having diabetes and had also denied having any family history of diabetes. This subgroup was presumed to be the low-risk population group.

Results

• The study population comprised of 142,391 men and 83,434 women. Overall, 78,694 (34.8%) participants reported to have pre-existing diabetes.
• Prevalence of diabetes among young individuals below the age of 35 years was as mentioned in Table 1.

Table 1: Prevalence of preexisting diabetes, newly detected diabetes, & total prevalence of diabetes among various age groups

• The prevalence of diabetes was highest in the age category of 30–34 years and lowest among 18–24 years of age (Table 2).

Table 2: Prevalence of preexisting diabetes, newly detected diabetes, & total prevalence of diabetes among various age categories

• Individuals with a family history of diabetes had a very high prevalence of diabetes at 40.1% (<35 yrs), 31.8% (<30 yrs), and 26.4% (<25 yrs), respectively.
• With regards to diabetes prevalence in low-risk population, overall prevalence was 13.1% in adults between 18 and 80 years of age in this subset, the prevalence was 6% in individuals aged <35 years, 4.7% in those aged <30 years, and 3.5% in those aged < 25 years.

Conclusions

• This is the first study evaluating the prevalence of diabetes in India with a huge sample size.
• The study reports high prevalence of diabetes in young Indians, even in those for whom routine screening is not recommended.
• The cut-off age of 30-35 years for routine diabetes screening should be further lowered for Indian population.
• Routine screening for diabetes beginning as early as 18 years of age might be worth consideration in Indian setting, especially for those with a family history of diabetes.

Int J Diabetes Dev Ctries. 2025; 45(1):96–102. DOI: 10.1007/s13410-024-01357-x