New UK research has found that diabetes patients with have poor control of their blood sugar may have a higher risk of hospitalisation due to infection, and possibly even death.

Carried out by researchers at St George’s, University of London, the large-scale study looked at more than 85,000 English adults aged 40 to 89 years with a diabetes diagnosis and a measurement of glycated hemoglobin, also known as long-term blood sugar, which is a marker of diabetes control.

Medical records on infection rates were also analysed to compare diabetes patients with poor control to those with good control, and to people without diabetes.

The findings, published in the journal Diabetes Care, showed that the risk for most types of infection, particularly those caused by bacteria, increased for those with the worst diabetes control, with diabetes patients with the worst control almost three times as likely to need hospital treatment for an infection compared to those with good control.

Patients with good diabetes control also had a higher risk of getting an infection compared to patients without diabetes, but the risk was lower in this group.

The risk of infection appeared to be highest in patients with type 1 diabetes and very poor control, with these patients showing an 8.5 times higher risk of needing hospital treatment compared to those without diabetes.

The researchers also found that it is the risk of rare but serious infections that seemed to increase the most by having poor control of diabetes.

“Across England as a whole, we found that poor diabetes control accounted for about 20% to 46% of some of the most serious types of infections (sepsis, bone and joint infections, tuberculosis and endocarditis) seen in diabetes patients,” added study author Professor Julia Critchley.

Also among the findings was that poor diabetes control accounted for 15% of pneumonia infections and 16% of all deaths related to infections.

“Pneumonia is very common and often causes death in older people, and we demonstrated a clear link to blood sugar control,” said Professor Critchley.

People with diabetes can control their blood sugar levels better through regular exercise, diet and maintaining a healthy weight, and taking medication when needed.

Health experts can also help by carefully increasing dose of any medicines or adding new medications as required.