Case Report
Thoracic spine fracture in the course of severe nocturnal hypoglycemia in young patients with type 1 diabetes mellitus—the role of low bone mineral density

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Abstract

Thus far, only a few spine fracture cases related to severe nocturnal hypoglycemia in type 1 diabetes patients have been reported. Due to the relatively young age of these subjects, osteoporosis was not taken into consideration and bone mineral density was not assessed.

We report three type 1 diabetes cases in young patients with durations of 2, 4, and 19 years. These patients had severe hypoglycemic attacks during night sleep with subsequent compression thoracic vertebrae fractures. Laboratory

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    Citation Excerpt :

    A hypoglycemic seizure may infrequently cause bone fractures; the most common are bilateral humeral fractures, with no other bone involvement (Hashmi et al., 2002; Lambrinoudakis et al., 2008; Ozçelik et al., 2006). Dorsal thoracic spinal fractures have been reported, likely caused by unopposed spinal flexion (Hepburn et al., 1989; Majkowska et al., 2014; Nabarro, 1985). In the present case, an etiology of hypoglycemic seizure is not supported; comparable trauma is not reported in the literature and it is highly doubtful that extremely hypoglycemic individuals could have survived to adulthood without modern medical treatment (Entmacher, 1975).

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Conflict of interest: The authors have explicitly stated that there are no conflicts of interest in connection with this article.

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