A new risk calculator will more accurately identify people with type 2 diabetes who are at risk of developing heart and circulatory diseases.
Doctors will be able to offer preventative treatment to ward off future heart attacks and strokes.
Globally, cardiovascular diseases, including coronary heart disease and stroke, are the leading cause of death, responsible for around 17.9 million deaths each year.
In the UK, around 4.5 million people are living with type 2 diabetes, and one third of adults with diabetes die from a heart or circulatory disease.
The SCORE2-Diabetes risk calculator, published in the European Heart Journal, will help doctors estimate the risk of developing heart or circulatory disease across the next decade.
An international team led by researchers at the University of Cambridge used anonymised data across ten years from 230,000 people with type 2 diabetes who had no history of heart or circulatory diseases, spanning seven countries, to build an algorithm.
The data revealed that over 43,000 cardiovascular events occurred during that period, including fatal or non-fatal heart attacks and strokes.
When testing the SCORE2-Diabetes on data from 210,000 people across four European countries, researchers discovered that it could predict the risk for people with type 2 diabetes with greater accuracy compared to the original algorithm.
The tool was then statistically recalibrated using region-specific cardiovascular and risk factor data to estimate cardiovascular risks according to the country of residence more accurately.
Included in the new European Society of Cardiology Guidelines, the risk tool builds on existing diabetes-specific models to adapt to Europe’s diverse populations and variations in heart and circulatory disease rates.
Researchers plan to continually update the algorithm to reflect any changes in population cardiovascular disease rates and risk factors over time.
Professor Nilesh Samani, medical director at the British Heart Foundation, said: “SCORE2-Diabetes is a valuable advance that will allow doctors to tailor pre-emptive treatments for individuals with type 2 diabetes based on their personal risk of heart and circulatory diseases.
“Such an approach is vital as clinicians in the UK and across Europe find new ways to reduce the high levels of ill health associated with diabetes.”