根據一項人群調查研究的結果提示，在50歲或更大年紀新發生的胰高血糖激素糖尿病，或許是胰腺癌潛在可能的一個指標。這項研究結果發表在2005年8月1日期出版的《胃腸病學》期刊之上。

這種新發生的糖尿病在診斷3年之內罹患癌癥的風險，比同齡人要高出8倍之多。胰腺癌在美國每年就奪去32000人的生命，同時每年有同樣數目的人被診斷罹患了胰腺癌?；颊咭恢钡郊膊⊥砥?，才疾病特異性的癥狀，主要是由于兩個原因。一是沒有通常罹患癌癥的高風險人群，二是缺乏就象前列腺特異抗原（PSA）用于前列腺癌診斷的胰腺癌血液學檢查方法。

這項新研究涉及了2122例50歲或者年紀更大的患者，結果顯示新罹患的糖尿病現在可以定義為胰腺癌的高風險人群。盡管1％達到糖尿病嚴格診斷標準的患者，在3年之內罹患胰腺癌；但是大多數患者在疾病診斷后的晚期才罹患胰腺癌。因為這項研究的患者并沒有進行過糖尿病患者胰腺癌的普查，所以研究小組著重關注那些疾病發生后得以診斷的患者。

美國Mayo診所的消化科專家、首席研究員Suresh Chari博士指出：“我們現在的目標是鑒別一種血液中的指標，這種指標能夠幫助我們區別與胰腺癌相關的糖尿病以及常見的普通2型糖尿病，這樣我們就能夠對新發糖尿病患者，在擴散之前就進行篩查胰腺癌。”
Diabetes a Sign of Pancreatic Cancer
 
The results of a population-based study have shown that new onset of hyperglycemic diabetes in adults 50 or older may be a sign of underlying pancreatic cancer. The results of the study were published in the August 1, 2005, issue of Gastroenterology.

The risk of developing the cancer within three years of a new diagnosis of diabetes is eight times higher than for the average same-age individual. Pancreatic cancer claims 32,000 lives in the United States alone each year and has an equal number of diagnoses annually. Patients seldom show disease-specific symptoms until the cancer is at an advanced stage, mainly because of two major obstacles. One is the lack of a high-risk group in whom the cancer is common, and the other is the lack of a blood test for pancreatic cancer that is similar to the prostate-specific antigen (PSA) test for prostate cancer.

This new study, involving 2,122 patients 50 or older, shows that new-onset diabetes now defines a high-risk group for pancreatic cancer. Although about 1% of patients who met fairly stringent criteria for diabetes developed pancreatic cancer within three years, in most patients the cancer was at an advanced stage at diagnosis. Since patients in the study had not been screened for diabetes or pancreatic cancer, the research team was looking at those diagnosed after the fact.

“Our goal now is to identify a marker in the blood that will enable us to distinguish diabetes associated with pancreatic cancer from the far more common type 2 diabetes, so we are able to screen patients with new-onset diabetes to detect pancreatic cancer before it spreads,” said lead investigator Dr. Suresh Chari, M.D., a gastroenterologist at the Mayo Clinic (Rochester, MN, USA).