Patients

In our retrospective association study, we included 724 Slovene patients who have had T2DM for at least 10 years. The diagnosis of T2DM and DN was made according to the World Health Organization criteria. We classified the participants in two groups, according to their nephrological diagnosis. The first group was comprised of 301 patients with DN, and the second (control) group was comprised of 423 patients without DN. The exclusion criteria for our study were overt nephropathy, active infection, poor glycemic control (glycated hemoglobin [HbA1c] above 10), significant heart failure (New York Heart Association [NYHA] Classification II-IV), alcoholism, and the presence of other possible causes of renal disease. We used a questionnaire to obtain information about age, sex, duration of T2DM, blood pressure, systolic pressure, diastolic pressure, duration of arterial hypertension (AH), smoking status, and other microvascular complications of T2DM (diabetic retinopathy [DR] and its duration, diabetic foot) and carotid disease. We measured the participants height, weight, and waist circumference. We took blood samples and measured the total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein (HDL), low-density lipoprotein (LDL), triglycerides, and HbA1c.

All participants provided informed consent before their blood samples were taken and analyzed. Our study was conducted according to the Helsinki declaration and approved by the Slovenian commission for medical ethics. The ethics number for our study was 105/12/2011.