Why does diabetes increase atherosclerosis? I don’t know!
J. Clin. Invest. Ira J. Goldberg, et al. 114:613 doi:10.1172/JCI22826 [Go to this article.]

Figure 1
Potential causes of diabetes-induced macrovascular disease. The presence of increased conventional risk factors in patients with diabetes is surely one reason for greater atherosclerosis (18). In some animal models, diabetes-induced hyperlipidemia occurs and may mask toxic effects of hyperglycemia that confer diabetes-specific risk. Among these effects may be the development of increased levels of AGEs, toxic intracellular reactions to glucose secondary to the production of increased reactive oxygen species (19), and multiple effects on the production of matrix proteins and the biology of cells within the vessel wall.