Sunday, 20 May 2007

What's the future of diabetes?

I was thinking today about how far we've come - Once upon a time a diabetic was diagnosed and only had months to live. Then we were peeing on sticks & not eating sugar, waiting for complications. Now we're aware of carbs, using BG meters, some have pumps & Continuous Glucose Monitoring, and we're able to live a normal life (bar the disruptions and holes in our fingers!) and hopefully a nice long healthy one!

What next? What do you see in the future of diabetes?

I see:

º CGMS as an almost every-day thing for us all. The same way our BG meters were once just a tool for doctors and have become something we all need for self-monitoring, I suspect a huge amount of us diabetics will end up with Continuous Glucose Monitoring. I hope so, anyway! Imagine the control possibilities! I've heard the latest ones still have some question about accuracy, but I hope that's sorted in the near future.

º More diabetics of all types becoming more aware of the benefits of low carb. Not that we'll all go 'Bernstein', but it seems that some level of carb avoidance works wonders for pretty much anyone who tries it.
I can't see all the current diabetes associations eating their hats over their current recommendations though, so I'm not sure what happens there... perhaps a slow reduction in their advised carb amounts. (it still kills me that a newly diagnosed diabetic in America can be told to eat MORE carbs than they currently do... and that's seen as a good thing? How does that make sense?)

º A cure? Not really. I can't see that happening any time soon. There may be ways to help the newly diagnosed, and better tools for helping us keep good control, but I suspect the cure is a lot further off than most of us would like!

º A new name for either type 2 or type 1 - I hope it's type 1, as type 2's are the ones that own the show where the word 'diabetes' is concerned. Also the bulk of diabetics are T2, so it makes sense to make the change with the smaller group.
- Maybe this will never happen, but it'd certainly make me a happier chappy!

Your turn. What do you think is in store for us?

1 comment:

Unknown said...

I hope that all of those happen, and soon.

One day we shall all have a pump with an integrated meter that will deliver just as much insulin as we need with little or no user intervention.

Diabetes is with us for life, anything that minimizes the impact has to be good.

I do have a new name for type 1 though -
Auto-immune Pancreatic Evil Syndrome.

I've always wanted APES!