Association of prodromal type 1 diabetes with school absenteeism of Danish schoolchildren: a population-based case control study of 1,338 newly diagnosed children
Research Design and Methods Population based retrospective case control study involving all Danish public-school children that developed type 1 diabetes (n= 1 338) from 2010-2017 matched 1:5 on sex and date of birth to children without diabetes (n= 6 690). Monthly absenteeism was compared 12 months before to 12 months after the diagnosis of type 1 diabetes.
Results Seven to 12 months before the diabetes diagnosis the mean (SD) number of days absent from school per month was 0.93 (1.78) among children with diabetes and 0.93 (1.82) among controls (difference: -0.004 days, p=0.94). From 4 months before diagnosis, children who developed diabetes had a statistically significant increase in absenteeism compared with controls (difference: 0.24 days, p<0.05).
CONCLUSION Children who were diagnosed with type 1 diabetes had increased school absenteeism 4 months prior to diagnosis.
