Did You Know? A1c Cutoff for Elderly Needs to Be Lowered

A1c Cutoff for Elderly Needs to Be Lowered: A cross sectional study of 90 patients without previous history of diabetes underwent screening and had both oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT) and HbA1c done at the same time. These patients were stratified into 4 age groups. Researchers found that HbA1c of 6.2% is the best cut-off to diagnose diabetes using ROC curve analysis. At the specified HbA1c, the area under ROC curve (AUROC) reduces as age group increases suggesting that sensitivity and specificity of HbA1c as diagnostic marker reduces as age increases. From the results it was concluded that HbA1c has a low sensitivity to diagnose diabetes in older subjects and caution is required when using HbA1c in isolation. This raises the possibility that a different cut-off value for different age groups may be more appropriate. Diabetes Research and Clinical Practice Jan 2011