Correlation of spot urine protein-creatinine ratio with 24-hour urinary protein in type 2 diabetes mellitus patients: a cross sectional study

Background: diabetic nephropathy is the major cause for chronic renal failure (crf) and proteinuria is an independ- ent risk factor for end stage renal disease. hence, early identification and quantification of proteinuria is of prime importance in the diagnosis and management. methods: this study was conducted amongst 42 diabetic subjects from hsk hospital, bagalkot. twenty four-hour urine protein and random urine protein to creatinine ratio (p:c) was determined. pearson’s correlation, sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values were determined using 24-hour urinary protein as a gold standard for spot urine p:c ratio. roc curve and area under curve was also determined using spss (11.5) software. all the results were expressed in mean±sd. results: forty two diabetes mellitus patients participated in this study. the average of 24 hour urinary protein was 1.6 ± 1.7 gm/day. the spot urine p:c ratio was 1.27 ± 1.55. there was a positive correlation between 24 hours urinary pro- tein and spot urine p:c ratio (r = 0.925, p < 0.0001). the area under the roc curve for urine p:c ratio at various cutoff was 0.947 (95% confidence interval: 0.831-0.992, p < 0.0001). the sensitivity and specificity was 80.65% and 100% respectively at p:c ratio cutoff of 0.3. conclusions: the random urine p:c ratio predicts the amount of 24-hour urinary protein excretion with high accu- racy. hence it can be used as a faster diagnostic substitute for 24-hour urinary protein estimation.