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This slide explains epidemiologic methods used in GDM research and some of its limitations.
As shown in this slide, identifying GDM is a two stage process. During 24-28 weeks of
gestation, the screening methods are applied to identify the potential subjects for GDM.
However, the screening methods vary widely and the following situations causes many false
positive subjects for the diagnostic test. For example, the higher the screening glucose
load or lower the threshold value, the higher the percentage of patients to be recommended
for the diagnostics test. Furthermore, diagnostic tests are also vary widely according to
diagnostic methods. During diagnostic tests, the amount of glucose load varies from 50 gm
to 100 gm, and duration of testing also varies from 2 to 3 hours. In addition to these
variabiles in method, the cut off values for the diagnosis varies. Therefore,
epidemiologic studies in GDM has been limited and it is still the major problem in
GDM researches.
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