The results demonstrated that DR patients carrying protective rs800292/AA genotype would present a longer gap (years) between diabetes and DR onset compared with that in patients carrying AG + GG (11.9 ± 5.2 versus 8.0 ± 4.4, P < 0.001; Figure 2), and such difference was not observed for CFB rs1048709 (9.6 ± 5.6 versus 8.3 ± 4.5, P = 0.11). Here, CFB is linked to diabetes mellitus.