Hypoglycemia awareness and its associated risk factors, in non-insulin-dependent diabetes in Hail region, Saudi Arabia.

OBJECTIVE: Hypoglycemia is one of the avoidable complications of diabetes mellitus type 1 or 2, which occurs in between 24% to 60% of diabetic patients. It is a state of low plasma glucose concentration, either with or without symptoms, that can expose the patient to risks. Hypoglycemia is associated with impaired brain function, cardiovascular and visual effects, and increased mortality. This study was conducted to assess the knowledge of hypoglycemia as a complication of diabetes mellitus type 2 and the awareness of risk factors among the Hail City population, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. SUBJECTS AND METHODS: We conducted a cross-sectional study targeting diabetic patients with type 2 in Hail province from April to August 2022. We used an online questionnaire distributed through popular social media, which included questions on age group, gender, BMI, social status, occupation, education, and income. RESULTS: Approximately 48.2% of patients had episodes of hypoglycemia in the previous three months, while 43% did not have hypoglycemic episodes. Among patients, 424 (73.7%) had less than three hypoglycemic episodes during the previous three months, and 121 (21%) had 3-6 episodes. CONCLUSIONS: Hypoglycemic episodes among diabetic patients have critical effects on the patient and may lead them to avoid diabetic drugs, causing hyperglycemia.

High throughput screening of human subtelomeric DNA for copy number changes using multiplex amplifiable probe hybridisation (MAPH).

BACKGROUND: Subtelomeric regions of the human genome are gene rich, with a high level of sequence polymorphism. A number of clinical conditions, including learning disability, have been attributed to subtelomeric deletions or duplications, but screening for deletion in these regions using conventional cytogenetic methods and fluorescence in situ hybridisation (FISH) is laborious. Here we report that a new method, multiplex amplifiable probe hybridisation (MAPH), can be used to screen for copy number at subtelomeric regions. METHODS: We have constructed a set of MAPH probes with each subtelomeric region represented at least once, so that one gel lane can assay copy number at all chromosome ends in one person. Each probe has been sequenced and, where possible, its position relative to the telomere determined by comparison with mapped clones. RESULTS: The sensitivity of the probes has been characterised on a series of cytogenetically verified positive controls and 83 normal controls were used to assess the frequency of polymorphic copy number with no apparent phenotypic effect. We have also used MAPH to test a cohort of 37 people selected from males referred for fragile X syndrome testing and found six changes that were confirmed by dosage PCR. CONCLUSIONS: MAPH can be used to screen subtelomeric regions of chromosomes for deletions and duplications before confirmation by FISH or dosage PCR. The high throughput nature of this technique allows it to be used for large scale screening of subtelomeric copy number, before confirmation by FISH. In practice, the availability of a rapid and efficient screen may allow subtelomeric analysis to be applied to a wider selection of patients than is currently possible using FISH alone.