Observational studyFrontiers in endocrinology2026
COVID-19 and subsequent risk of coded diabetic retinopathy in patients with type 2 diabetes: a multicenter propensity score-matched cohort study.
Observational study in Frontiers in endocrinology, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Background: Evidence remains limited regarding whether coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is associated with the subsequent risk of EHR-recorded diabetic retinopathy (DR) during available follow-up in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). We evaluated the risk of EHR-recorded DR and clinically relevant DR subtypes after severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection during follow-up within a maximum 5-year analytic window. Methods: This retrospective multicenter cohort study used the TriNetX Global Collaborative Network. Adults with T2DM were classified into COVID-19 and control groups between January 1, 2020, and June 30, 2022. A 6-month landmark design was applied to reduce early outcome misclassification. After 1:1 propensity score matching, 773,768 patients were included in each group. The primary outcome was electronic health record (EHR)-recorded incident DR. Secondary outcomes included EHR-recorded DR subtypes (non-proliferative DR, proliferative DR, and diabetic macular edema) and glycemic events, including hyperglycemia (glucose ≥180 mg/dL), poor glycemic control (HbA1c ≥9%), and hypoglycemia (glucose <70 mg/dL). Secondary and supportive analyses were exploratory and were not adjusted for multiplicity. Results: Median follow-up was 1,487 days in the COVID-19 group and 1,634 days in controls. EHR-recorded incident DR occurred more frequently in the COVID-19 group than in the control group (2.17% vs. 1.64%; absolute risk difference, 0.53 percentage points; hazard ratio [HR], 1.51; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.48-1.55; p<0.001). COVID-19 was also associated with higher risks of non-proliferative DR (HR, 1.53; 95% CI, 1.49-1.58), proliferative DR (HR, 1.67; 95% CI, 1.57-1.78), and diabetic macular edema (HR, 1.75; 95% CI, 1.67-1.83). In addition, COVID-19 was associated with increased risks of glycemic events. The associations remained consistent across sensitivity analyses, including survivor-only, healthcare-visit-restricted, eye-care-visit-restricted, 1-year landmark, and 2-year landmark models. Exploratory severe-COVID analysis showed a similar direction of association. Conclusions: Among adults with T2DM, COVID-19 was associated with an increased risk of EHR-recorded incident DR, including coded vision-threatening subtypes (proliferative DR and diabetic macular edema), during follow-up. These findings suggest a possible association between COVID-19 and subsequent EHR-recorded DR during available follow-up, although residual confounding and differential ophthalmic surveillance cannot be excluded.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.