New research from New York University Rory Meyers College of Nursing (NYU Meyers) shows that women with diabetes are increasingly susceptible to developing depression.

Though both men and women with diabetes are more prone to developing depression, younger women with poor health and limited education are at a greater risk. The results, published Nov. 9 in The Diabetes Educator, should help improve screening and treatment for diabetic women.

"The diabetes/depression comorbidity is associated with greater healthcare costs, poorer self-care, less medication compliance and dietary adherence, a greater diabetes symptom burden, poorer quality of life, and premature mortality," said Shiela Strauss, the lead author on the study and an associate professor of nursing at NYU Meyers, in a statement from NYU.

Strauss and her team studied date from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), a collection of studies designed to examine the health and nutritional status of adults and children in the U.S.

"NHANES is exceptional in the collection of various types of data," Strauss said. "By combining interviews with physical examinations, NHANES uniquely gathers sociodemographic and physiological data, including existing medical conditions and history."

The investigators looked at data from 2007 to 2012 among almost nine million diabetic women aged 20 and older. Results from a depression questionnaire showed that 1.7 million, or 19 percent, of them were clinically depressed.

"What's particularly salient to me is that women who were limited in their ability to carry on their usual activities because of pain, or who were inactive due to poor health, were especially likely to have comorbid depression," Strauss said. "These may not be the first factors people would associate with depression in adult women living with diabetes; empirical evidence only goes so far. But through our analysis of the NHANES dataset we were able to identify them as strong predictors of comorbid depression among women."