Scientists have developed a new screening method that uses body measurement to estimate diabetes risk without a laboratory test.
The researchers used a free online screening tool that considers the length of a person’s thigh alongside six more familiar health indicators. The tool, called MEDWACS, estimates the likelihood that an adult has prediabetes or undiagnosed type 2 diabetes without requiring blood testing, an unusual approach that could help address a major blind spot in public health.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), about 115.2 million US adults have prediabetes, and roughly eight in 10 do not know it. Prediabetes often causes no clear symptoms, yet it raises the risk of developing type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and stroke.
“Type 2 diabetes is easy to diagnose with a blood test, but if you don’t suspect you have it, you won’t go to the doctor to have one done. That’s why an online test at home can encourage people to see a doctor,” said Daniel Yoo, a postdoctoral researcher at DTU Sustain who led the project.
Yoo and his team created MEDWACS with DTU Professor Olivier Jolliet and Umberto Maggiore, an Italian physician and researcher at the University of Parma who specialises in kidney disease. Diabetes can damage the kidneys when elevated blood sugar harms their filtering system over time.
In their peer-reviewed study published in the Journal of Clinical Epidemiology, the scientists disclosed how the MEDWACS test works, and to get the result, adults enter seven pieces of information like age, sex, body mass index, waist circumference, systolic blood pressure, upper arm circumference, and thigh length.
The measurements can be collected at home with a tape measure, bathroom scale, and standard blood pressure monitor. The researchers selected these seven factors from nearly 3,700 candidates analysed by a machine learning system.
The diabetes risk model was developed using 30 years of data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, a major US health research program. It included adults of both sexes beginning at age 18.
The team then evaluated the model using separate datasets from the United States and South Korea. Because researchers already knew which participants had prediabetes or diabetes, they could compare the tool’s predictions with confirmed health outcomes.
In both external validations, MEDWACS performed as well as or better than other established risk assessment methods, according to the study. The researchers concluded that it could offer an accessible way to identify people who should seek clinical testing.
Among the seven factors, thigh length is easily the most unexpected. Even the researchers were initially surprised that it carried useful information.
Maggiore said the measurement may capture two different influences on diabetes risk: childhood development and adult muscle mass.
