: Can Prediabetes cause coronary heart disease? Is prediabetes a risk factor for coronary heart disease? In other words, can it cause angina, heart attacks and sudden death? Thanks for your answers.

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I checked myself and found that yes, prediabetes is also a risk factor for coronary heart disease.

Prediabetes is the condition when fasting blood sugar is 100-125 mg/dl or 2 hour blood sugar is 140-200 mg/dl (more than 125 fasting or >200 after 2 hours will be diagnostic of diabetes).

A number of longitudinal studies have shown that prediabetes is associated with increased risk of coronary heart disease which may cause angina, heart attack and sudden death.

Hence, lifestyle modification is advised to all persons with prediabetes. These include regular exercise, maintaining ideal body weight, stopping smoking, keeping blood cholesterol and blood pressure under control.

Persons who have other risk factors of coronary heart disease also, such as high blood pressure, obesity, increased blood lipids etc, may also be treated with metformin, a commonly used drug for control of diabetes.

These interventions reduce the risk of progression to diabetes and occurrence of its complications including coronary heart disease.

Some also recommend use of aspirin and/or statins for persons at high risk for coronary heart disease.

Reference: care.diabetesjournals.org/content/30/3/753.full.pdf+html