Education to Help Counter the Growing Epidemic
Every day, more than 4000 people in the United States are diagnosed with diabetes. Understanding how to manage this complex disease begins with education. But with the time pressures that medical practices face today, many patients never receive the education and ongoing support they need to make the lifestyle choices that can lead to better health management.
Increased patient education is something in which health plans, physicians, and diabetes educators should all have a vested interest. Helping your members make the behavioral changes that can lead to better health outcomes is a mission and a commitment we share. Preparing patients to be active participants in their own care can be a first step toward helping to stem the tide of this growing epidemic. The articles below underscore the need for better education moving forward.
- The Diabetes Epidemic gives you an overview of the demographic and socioeconomic aspects of type 2 diabetes. It also touches on the ways that lack of awareness and poor patient control of risk factors serve only to intensify the epidemic.
- Inadequate Control of Cardiovascular Risk Factors delves into data that illustrate how the majority of patients do not have some of the major cardiovascular risk factors associated with type 2 diabetes (A1C, blood pressure, and cholesterol) under control.
- Many Patients Are Undereducated presents facts and trends that demonstrate how a substantial number of patients remain undereducated about their disease—even years after initial diagnosis.
