Warwick Postgraduate Poster Competition 2008
Post graduate poster fair, Warwick University - Medicine faculty winner and regional finalist.
Lay abstract
Vitamin B1, diabetes and vascular damage – what's the connection?
Vitamin B1 (thiamine) is essential and used by the body to help divert glucose away from potentially damaging pathways into safer metabolites with little potential for damage. We looked at thiamine levels in plasma of type I and type II diabetic patients, who have elevated blood glucose levels, and compared them to healthy controls. We found that diabetic patients have a markedly decreased thiamine level (decreased 76% for type I and 75% for type II diabetics from control levels). The rate of renal clearance of thiamine in diabetic patients was increased 24 fold in type I patients and 16 fold in type II patients. Furthermore, levels of soluble vascular cell adhesion molecule 1 (a marker of vascular damage) were negatively correlated with plasma thiamine levels.
Poster preview. Click to enlarge.
