[Study of the course of development in 84 non-insulin-dependent diabetics over a 5-to-10-year period. Their therapeutic outcome].

The clinical, biological and therapeutic course of non-insulin-dependent (type II) diabetes mellitus was studied in 84 patients followed up for five to ten years. Three-quarters of these patients, who had had diabetes mellitus for approximately ten years in most cases, were well controlled although they remained overweight, presumably as a result of poor compliance with nutritional prescriptions. Disturbances in lipids were only incompletely corrected in 60% of patients. Arterial hypertension persisted in 15%. Oral therapy remained effective in 70% of patients. Among the 30% of patients given insulin, 13% were so treated because of renal failure. Notwithstanding the satisfactory control of diabetes mellitus, probably as a result of the persistence of other risk factors, micro and macroangiopathic complications occurred or worsened during the follow up period.