A research team led by Prof. Ma Ching-wan Ronald (left), Prof. Chan Chung-ngor Juliana (centre), and Dr. So Wing-yee (right), clinical associate professor (honorary), Department of Medicine and Therapeutics, has discovered a genetic predictor of diabetes among Chinese patients, which may help to identify high-risk individuals, in a collaborative study with Shanghai Jiao Tong University Affiliated Sixth People's Hospital. The findings have been published online in Diabetologia (25 March).

The study, conducted from 2008 to 2012, identified a genetic marker on chromosome 7 near the paired box gene 4 (PAX4) gene which was associated with diabetes as well as poorer insulin response. People with this genetic marker have approximately 18% higher risk of having diabetes and will develop diabetes at a younger age.

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