Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the primary cause of premature morbidity and mortality in type 1 diabetes, with this effect particularly pronounced in those diagnosed at a younger age. The magnitude of this problem has recently been starkly highlighted by findings from the Swedish National Diabetes Register, where patients diagnosed with diabetes between 1 and 10 years of age were found to have a 10× higher risk of future acute myocardial infarction compared to those diagnosed between the ages of 26 and 30 years, and over a 30× higher risk than the general population. These and other data suggest that adolescence may be a particularly crucial time in the development of future CVD complications in type 1 diabetes, and that effective intervention at this age may offer long-lasting benefits for cardiovascular health.

While compromised glycaemic control represents the major risk factor for CVD complications in type 1 diabetes, individuals living with the disease are also exposed to many other well-established and potentially modifiable risk factors faced by the population at-large. Obesity is a well-established causal driver of subclinical disease in the young, is known to track into adulthood, and therefore represents one of the major risk factors in early-life for future risk of CVD. Although individuals with type 1 diabetes have traditionally been considered to be a relatively lean population, recent evidence has shown that obesity rates in this group are now similar or possibly even higher than in the general population, with an alarmingly high prevalence in children and adolescents.

For the last 14 years, our group have tracked, genotyped, and extensively phenotyped a cohort of adolescents with type 1 diabetes; first as part of a randomised clinical trial (The Adolescent type 1 Diabetes cardio-renal Intervention Trial - AdDIT), and then as part of a long-term epidemiological study (AdDIT Follow-Up). We now wish to use this data alongside that collected over the same timespan in ALSPAC to address the following aims and objectives: