Comment on: Prevalence of diabetes mellitus in a Saudi community Ann Saudi Med 2011;31(1):19-23

To the Editor: The original article published by Alqurashi et al in the January-February 2011 of the Annals.¹ provided valuable information regarding the most common non-communicable disease affecting the population in their productive life. However, some limitations that we would like to point out include:

1. In the section on methodology, the characteristics of the population served by the department of primary care are not mentioned in the article. Moreover, it is not clear whether this department is the only center receiving patients from the defined geographical area since the availability, accessibility and acceptability factors related to the services provided will affect the obtained prevalence as well as the profile (age, gender) of the diabetic patients.

2. Statistical tests mentioned in the methodology include univariate analysis, t test, Pearson correlation and linear regression but results do not show the application of any of these tests.

3. In the results section authors have reported a total of 6024 patients, but the total in the text as well as the Table 1 does not add up to this. In other words, authors have not mentioned about missing values. In Figure 1, the values given in x axis with regard to categorization of BMI are not correct (18.5-54.9). The reference for the categorization of BMI is not found in the article.