The Relationship between Smoking as a Modifiable Risk Factor and Chronic Complications on Elderly with Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus

Smoking is known as a variable that can be changed through a specific intervention activity. Recently in Indonesia, research related to chronic complication among elderly with type 2 Diabetes Mellitus (DM) was not available. This research has objective in exploring the risk of smoking towards chronic complication among elderly with type 2 DM. This research was using Riset Kesehatan Dasar (Riskesdas) in 2007. Riskesdas is a representative Indonesia Health Survey. 1,565 elderly (aged 60++ years) with type 2 DM have selected by random. 70-80% of the elderly have Chronic Complications and 32.11% of the sample is smokers. The elderly who smoke more than 24 cigarettes per day have risk 2.5 (95% CI, 1.54-3.97), smoker 1-12 cigarettes per day, and smoker 13-24 cigarettes per day have risk 1.3 and 1.6 respectively to get chronic complication compared with those who do not smoke, controlled by age, obesity, and physical activity. The proportion of smokers among elderly with type 2 DM is high, most of them are low education, low socioeconomic status, lack of access to the health services, low of physical activity, and low consume vegetables and fruit. Smoking increases the risk of chronic complication of type 2 DM