Protein requirement and its intake in subjects with diabetic foot ulcers at a tertiary care hospital

Objective: To assess the protein intake and requirement among subject with type 2 diabetes having foot ulcers.

Methods: This study was conducted at Baqai Institute of Diabetology & Endocrinology (BIDE), a tertiary care diabetes centre of Karachi, Pakistan among people with type 2 diabetic foot ulcer attending foot clinic from January 2012 to March 2015. The baseline characteristics, dietary intake and laboratory investigations of the study participants were obtained through electronic hospital database “Health Management System” (HMS) based on the 24 hours dietary recall interview. Total grams of protein were calculated from each food group consumed by the subject. Protein intake of the subjects was recorded in mean grams and the protein requirement was calculated according to their body weight. The comparison of intake and requirement of protein choices was done through comparing the mean of both variables. SPSS version 13 was used for analysing the results.

Results: A total of 542 subjects were included in the study, 365 (67.2%) were males and 178 (32.8%) were females. Mena age of the subject was 54.61±10.51 (yrs) with the duration of diabetes and mean body mass index were 14.22±7.98 (yrs) and 26.65±5.38 (kg/m2), respectively. The dietary records showed the protein intake of subjects with diabetic foot ulcer is not appropriate when compared to daily requirement. Mean grams of protein intake is 76.87gms in males and 56.84gms in females. On the other-hand protein requirement is much higher than the intake, which is 219.5gms in males and 130.2gms in females.

Conclusion: Dietary counselling should be a part of the treatment among subjects with diabetic foot ulcer to identify their nutritional needs and suggesting them better option to fulfil their protein requirement essential for wound healing process.