Two tests given to relatives of diabetics have proven effective in identifying people who will get diabetes and gauging how long it will take for the disease to develop, researchers said Thursday.

"The ability to identify people who are in the process of developing diabetes can be very important," said Dr. Sri S. Srikanta, the primary author of a report on the tests published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

"Secondly, this will enable us to identify people who should be watched at regular intervals and kept appraised of other research advances that might lead to a means of preventing the diabetes from developing," said Srikanta, an investigator at the Joslin Diabetes Center in Boston and an instructor at Harvard Medical School.