Important reminders on Diabetes Alert Day
Today is Diabetes Alert Day and Dr. Ashok Balasubramanyam, professor of medicine – diabetes, endocrinology and metabolism at Baylor College of Medicine, gives us a few important reminders about diabetes and pre-diabetes.
- All adults should be screened for diabetes.
- If you’ve been diagnosed with pre-diabetes, meaning you are at high risk for developing the disease, work with your physician to take important steps to prevent diabetes. This can include controlling your cholesterol and blood pressure and starting an exercise regimen to help you lose weight. Some people can also start diabetes medications in the pre-diabetes stage.
- If you are diagnosed with diabetes, work with your physician to start treatment immediately. Most treatment is helpful and does not have drastic side effects.
- The consequences of not knowing or not treating diabetes are severe. About 50 to 60 percent of those who are diagnosed with diabetes at a later stage already have complications such as cardiac disease, nerve problems or abnormal kidney function.
For those with pre-diabetes, Baylor is recruiting volunteers to take part in the first definitive, large-scale clinical trial funded by the National Institutes of Health to investigate if a vitamin D supplement helps prevent or delay type 2 diabetes in adults. For more information, visit www.d2dstudy.org, call 713-798-3741 or email VitDstudy@bcm.edu.
For those newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, Baylor is recruiting volunteers for the GRADE study funded by the National Institutes of Health that will compare the long-term benefits and risk of four widely used diabetes drugs in combination with metformin, the most common first-line medication for treating type 2 diabetes. For more information, visit www.gradestudy.com or call 713-798-3625.
