The importance of diabetes mellitus as a major cause of mortality and morbidity and its claim on healthcare provision is increasingly recognized. Diabetes has now become a major worldwide public health problem with projections of an increase in numbers from presently almost 200 million people to around 370 million by 2025.

Diabetes-related chronic complications often cause premature mortality, as well as blindness, foot ulceration, and amputation. The health care and social care costs of managing these complications are enormous, but new treatments, devices, and clinical management protocols are steadily improving the longer term outcomes for people with diabetes. In recent years major advances have occurred in our understanding of the pathogenesis of diabetic microvascular complications. The major theories regarding the development of microvascular complications are based on metabolic and vascular changes. Important developments have also pointed to possibilities for prevention and early treatment of microvascular complications which may affect patients with diabetes.

Potential topics include but are not limited to the following:

• Pathogenesis of diabetic microvascular complications
• The epidemiology of diabetic microvascular complications
• Diabetic retinopathy and other ocular complications
• Diabetic nephropathy
• Connective tissue disorder in diabetes
• Diabetic neuropathies
• The diabetic foot
• The effect of antidiabetic therapy on diabetic microvascular complications
• Erectile dysfunction in diabetes mellitus