November is Diabetes Awareness month. Over the next four weeks, I’ll share with you important information everyone should know about diabetes. I say “everyone” because diabetes, although chronic once it is diagnosed, is an entirely preventable disease. If you don’t have diabetes, the knowledge you gain here may inspire you to help a loved one, friend, or co-worker who’s at risk of getting it.
Over the years, my clients have been my greatest teachers. With them, I have learned about the seemingly insurmountable challenges as well as the unbelievable successes of living with diabetes. I’ll share some of their stories with you during this month, too.
First, let’s get a lay of the land. Diabetes is on the rise. When I was in grad school, one of my professors told me not to bother specializing in diabetes because pancreas transplants would soon cure diabetes. Well, she was wrong.
An estimated 7 percent of the total population has diabetes. That may not sound like much to you, but think of it this way: the estimated risk of developing diabetes is one in three for both men and women just 40 years of age! For this group, that’s a higher risk higher than the risk of developing breast cancer, and almost as high as for heart disease. In 2005, 1.5 million new cases of diabetes were diagnosed in people over age 20.
But the most alarming estimates of the diabetes risk affect our children: one in three children born in the United States in the year 2000 will develop diabetes. The risk is even higher for Hispanic children: one in two, or 50 percent, of them will develop diabetes.
Some of you, especially if you are young and in relatively good health, may be saying, “So what? what is the big deal with diabetes?” Instead of focusing on the statistics or the lifelong and serious complications of diabetes, let me tell you the story of just one of my clients.
When I first met Mary (not her real name) two years ago, she was in her 50s but looked more like she was in her 60s. An intelligent professional, Mary could no longer practice her profession. She had about every complication of diabetes you could imagine. She was legally blind from diabetic retinopathy.
She was on dialysis three times each week because of her diabetic nephropathy (kidney damage). She had diabetic neuropathy (nerve pain and numbing in her hands and feet), and the many pains in her feet had left her wheelchair bound. Mary was also incontinent from diabetic autonomic neuropathy, which affects involuntary processes like digestion.
Mary spent much of her time in outpatient clinics and every so often had to be admitted to the hospital to deal with one of her many complications. When our team began working with her, our approach was different than it would have been for most other patients with diabetes: we simply wanted to keep her alive. After following her for about a year, Mary’s years of smoking caught up with her and she was diagnosed with lung cancer. Mary died shortly after her cancer diagnosis.
So what’s the big deal with diabetes? If Mary’s story didn’t bring home how diabetes can affect a person’s quality of life, here’s another fact to consider: in 2002, our society was burdened by the $92 billion spent to cover the direct medical costs of diabetes – that’s $132 billion when you also include indirect costs such as disability, work loss, and premature death.
Let Mary’s story be a call to action for you and your loved ones. What are you going to do to stop the rise in diabetes?
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