According to the ADA, the diagnosed cost of diabetes in the United States is estimated to be $412.9 billion in 2022, including both direct medical costs and indirect costs like lost productivity. As the prevalence of diabetes continues to rise, costs will climb higher and higher, placing an unsustainable and unnecessary burden on our health system and economy. It points to a stark, uncomfortable realization that the biggest cost burden on the American taxpayer isn’t drugs (11 percent of the total national health spend); it is the cost of manageable disease run amuck.

While the White House and Congress rightly tout their success in lowering the cost of insulin for Americans in need, the policy victory speaks to the persistent problem—akin to closing the barn door after the horse has escaped—that more and more people are being diagnosed with or unaware of their diabetes risks. The bigger “hairy audacious goal” is to reduce the number of people with diabetes in the first place.

A Tale of Two Americas

The Type 2 diabetes epidemic is not an equal opportunity offender. It disproportionately affects racial and ethnic minorities, as well as those with lower educational attainment and socioeconomic status. This is not a coincidence; it results from systemic inequalities plaguing our health-delivery system. It speaks to the long overdue need to use PK-12 education to inform young people about healthy diets.

Black Americans, Hispanic/Latino Americans, and Native Americans bear a heavier burden of this disease because of deeply rooted social determinants of health. Access to quality healthcare, education, and economic opportunities are crucial in determining who develops Type 2 diabetes and who doesn’t.

According to the ADA: “The poorer you are in America, the less likely you are to have a grocery store within walking distance of your home. Diabetes rates are inversely related to income level, and nutrition is critical to diabetes prevention and management. Every American with diabetes and prediabetes must have access to affordable, culturally relevant food and the information they require to eat healthfully.”

At the heart of this crisis lies a fundamental issue raised for years: our relationship with food and education. The lack of basic nutritional literacy in many communities is not just unfortunate; it’s a tipping point for heart disease and diabetes. Many Americans, particularly in underserved communities, make food choices that harm their health because of strained household economics or lack of information. The food label on packaged goods is helpful to those who can translate the percentages listed into actionable decisions. Still, desperation often makes those decisions for people regardless of what the label says.

In urban and rural areas with limited access to fresh, nutritious food, food deserts are not just inconveniences but public health hazards. When the only food options available are processed, high-calorie, or convenient and tasty fast foods, we set up communities for a lifetime of health struggles.

Innovation and Public Policy: Islands of Hope

Traditional approaches are proving inadequate in the face of this growing threat. The health system needs to embrace innovative, policy- and technology-driven solutions that can reach people where they are and provide personalized support.

More than 41 million people participate in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and receive an average monthly benefit of $191 per person, or a little over $2 per meal. ​Roughly four out of 10 SNAP participants (42%) are children under age 18; 16% are people 60 and older, and about 12% are people with disabilities. The results are dramatic!

Children receiving SNAP benefits have better health status than youngsters who are not SNAP participants, and their households are less likely to sacrifice health care to pay for other necessary expenses. Older SNAP participants are less likely to be admitted to a nursing home or hospital than their counterparts who do not participate. It seems like common sense. Caring for the chronically ill costs taxpayers more.

Telemedicine and remote monitoring technologies offer potential avenues for diabetes management. These tools can provide real-time data to healthcare providers, allowing for more timely interventions and personalized care plans. AI-powered nutritional guidance apps have the potential to democratize access to customized meal plans, accounting for an individual’s health status, cultural preferences, and economic constraints. These tech tools can only be used as preventive and interventional extensions of the doctor’s office if third-party payers – private and public – ensure it is in the health providers’ interests. 

On the pharmaceutical side of innovation are the GLP-1 receptors – that can help millions of people struggling with obesity – among the key catalysts for the surge in pre- and Type 2 diabetes. GLP-1 receptor agonists mimic the hormone’s action, crucial in regulating blood sugar levels. But here’s the kicker: these drugs don’t just lower blood glucose; they’re a Swiss Army knife of metabolic health. However, private payers often place obstacles in the path of access. Obesity is a complex – tipping point – disease leading to diabetes, mental health challenges, heart disease, and more. Payers often will not authorize GLP-1 use for people who are overweight and have prediabetes – waiting till people (their beneficiaries) graduate to Type 2, citing cost.

The Obesity Society spokesperson Katherine H. Saunders, MD, of Weill Cornell Medicine, New York City, in an interview with Medscape, comments: “What is more expensive than Wegovy (a GLP-1 class drug)? A day in the hospital. This is a particularly important finding for health plans, employers, and any group covering the total cost of care — many of whom are concerned about the cost of Wegovy. Hopefully, this data will encourage more decision makers to recognize not only the significant health benefits associated with Wegovy but also potential cost savings.” Dr. Saunders is among the nation’s top thinkers in the field of obesity and associated conditions, and as an entrepreneur, co-founded FlyteHealth, a community of health providers who specialize in helping people manage their weight.

Health- or Sick-Care – We Must Choose a Path

The economic impact of Type 2 diabetes is staggering. The time for half-measures and incremental change is long past. We need a coordinated, multisectoral response—the health sector, industry, government, and private philanthropy—working together to address the epidemic’s foundational causes.

Five suggestions include:

1. Investing in education at the primary school level and ensuring children understand healthy food choices and have access to in-school meals.
2. Addressing social determinants of health through Federal and state policies that promote economic equity and access to quality health and education
3. Leveraging well-proven approaches in remote patient monitoring to improve diabetes intervention, detection, and management
4. Strengthening the use of Federal and state programs such as SNAP and the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP)
5. Fostering collaboration between health providers, community organizations, national professional health organizations and tech companies to deploy proven solutions.

The Future We Must Embrace

Current efforts to address Type 2 and prediabetes prevention are insufficient. By acknowledging the complex relationship among social, educational, economic, and environmental factors contributing to this chronic illness epidemic, the United States private and public health system must examine drug costs; however, it can develop more effective policies and campaigns for diabetes intervention and management. 

It’s time for a mindset shift in approaching this preventable condition. We must recognize that we have, to date, given lip service and window dressing to address disparities and support the needs of children growing up without sufficient knowledge about food choices or, in the case of cash-strapped families, access to a healthy meal that reinforces what they are learning in school. Half measures were never good enough and are no longer acceptable.

Every step toward managing Type 2 diabetes – or better yet, preventing it entirely – is a step toward a healthier, more equitable society. The challenge is immense, but the ability to make a difference is possible.  There are proven delivery methods for insulin, vastly improved ways to monitor blood glucose and policies that could be tweaked to meet people’s needs.  Together, we can turn the tide on this epidemic and create a future where Type 2 diabetes is no longer a looming threat but a manageable condition.

Pay now or pay later. It’s a decision payers and policymakers must make.

The post The Diabetes Epidemic: A Pressing Public Health Catastrophe appeared first on Medika Life.

Among those with the most significant risk are older Americans with chronic conditions. From the earliest stages of the pandemic until now, COVID hospitalizations have been six times higher and deaths 12 times higher for people with underlying medical (i.e., non-communicable diseases – NCDs) conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, or chronic lung disease. Currently, 81% of COVID deaths occur in people over age 65. The number of deaths among people over age 65 is 97 times higher than that among people ages 18-29. It’s a dangerous situation that we can overcome if we prepare before the next pandemic wave.

COVID + Diabetes = Serious Risk

For example, consider the brutal truth about one of the deadliest comorbidities in COVID at-risk communities: diabetes.

• Diabetes disproportionately affects racial/ethnic minority populations. Compared with white adults, the risk of having a diabetes diagnosis is 77% higher among African Americans, 66% higher among Latinos/Hispanics, and 18% higher among Asian Americans
• Diabetes prevalence is approximately 17% higher in rural areas than in urban areas, with studies showing that rural adults were more likely to report a diagnosis of diabetes than urban counterparts
• Some 33% of adults aged 65 or older have pre- or Type 2 diabetes. This age group is more at risk of developing diabetes-related complications like low blood sugar, kidney failure, and heart disease than younger people.

The scale of this patient challenge is immense. Approximately 84 million adults — more than 1 in 3 Americans — have prediabetes. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), 90% of people with prediabetes do not know they have it; neither do they know that if left unchecked, it may lead to Type 2 diabetes.

Though its symptoms are subtle, prediabetes is insidious, and as with elevated blood pressure and high cholesterol, it can quickly become deadly. Add another pandemic into the mix, and we know where our subsequent waves of hospitalizations and deaths will come from: seniors, people of color, and rural Americans. We are not prepared, but if we recognize the risk and mobilize health professionals now, we will save lives later.

Further complicating our ability to address this threat is our disregard for prediabetes. For many people, prediabetes means, “Whew! I don’t have diabetes.” But prediabetes requires critical intervention and requires patients to change their behavior. Public health leaders must organize payers, patient groups, and providers – especially pharmacists and long-term care pharmacists – and that must happen before the next pandemic hits. We must get smarter and faster and not wait until the coffins pile up.

Primary Care Has A Change of Address

While this pressing public health threat becomes more urgent, our front-line defense, primary care, undergoes retreat in some cases and fundamentally changes to a retail pharmacy setting in others. These changes may presage increased access to care for some. Conversely, it could allow older patients to fall through the cracks in the face of the growing threat of non-communicable illnesses such as diabetes.

Historically, primary care providers diagnosed, treated, and engaged these consumers. Can walk-in services alleviate people’s ongoing care burden and be ready for the next pandemic?  Corporate and clinical leaders of the mega-chains and community retail pharmacies retail must rally these sites to be front-line communicators regarding non-communicable illnesses, especially prediabetes. Pharmacies are no longer just locations where you can grab a jab – an immunization, vaccine, or booster. Pharmacists will need greater input and support as we go forward and face emerging pandemics.

The ability to walk into a CVS MinuteClinic, Walgreen Health Corner, or Walmart Health for primary care is a win for access to manage pressing health needs. But will ongoing, long-term preventive care — featuring a plan for wellness care instead of sick care — be addressed at these sites? People “shop around” for medical convenience and not necessarily for provider relationships, another reason retail clinics need to be part of the preventive care solution.

Today, fewer and fewer people have a long-term family physician who tracks their needs and feels responsible for their longevity. The single-practitioner office is now being absorbed into larger practice groups and private practices are vanishing. Without the diagnostic oversight a trusted healthcare provider offers, we are missing an essential link between urgent and specialty care,  prevention and illness,  and prediabetes and diabetes.

Weathering the Storm

It is a perfect storm. Poorer diet, higher sugar intake, and increasingly sedentary lifestyle lead to prediabetes, which isn’t straightforward to diagnose and is often not taken seriously by patients. And, as we have seen, the essential player in defense against the condition — the primary care physician — is beginning to step off the stage.

To meet the challenges posed by diabetes/prediabetes epidemic, the lack of primary care patient support, and the persistent threats posed by COVID and other pandemics which will emerge, we need to consider the following actions:

1. Easy-Access Diagnostics Technologies – Retail pharmacies must ally with point-of-care and home-testing companies such as Babson Diagnostics and ixlayer. Consumers at risk must be empowered to take greater responsibility for their well-being. Give people with NCDs easily accessible tools to be full partners in preventive care.

• Find a Digital Connection – Netflix pings us about movies and TV shows that might attract our interest. Political parties use texts and email to rally the faithful. It’s time health insurance companies and the CDC find creative ways to enter the game using AI and digital health to establish closer relationships with consumers, helping people with diabetes to become aware of and purchase products to address their healthy lifestyle needs. Keeping people alive and well is a mutual interest of insurers and the CDC.
• Deputize Pharmacists:Pharmacists were always able to do much more than give shots, and now primary care nurses and assistants have found a home in retail pharmacies.  CDC and physician associations need to recognize that seniors and people with diabetes increasingly see pharmacy as a go-to for questions, easily accessible solutions, and vaccinations.  The American Pharmacists Association is raising the bar on public health resources.

• Start Talking to People: There is “no one-size fits all” effective way to communicate about COVID-19. The 65+ community faces different risks than the 15-and-under crowd.  People with diabetes and heart disease face heightened risks from COVID.  People of color are often at particular risk for these illnesses, compounded by COVID. The CDC needs to address people’s specific needs and risks better. People are tired of hearing about COVID. They are less worn out from hearing about what matters to their particular interests.

CDC is the target of many critiques right now. More than 80 years ago, British Wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill told the New Statesman: “Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfills the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.”  For people in science, failure does not mean the end – it’s the rocket fuel of future success. The CDC will learn from the COVID chapter and return ready for the next viral confrontation.  Our lives depend on its success.

The post Taking On Prediabetes Could be America’s Best Defense Against COVID-19 appeared first on Medika Life.

Telehealth services remain distant dreams to others. The digital divide further expands the wedge between the haves and have-nots, people with broadband, and others in rural America. Survival — whether to schedule a vaccine or doctor’s appointment — rests on being tech-literate. Good intent alone cannot resolve access-to-care problems.

The words of Howard University’s President, Dr. Wayne A.I. Frederick, who is also a professor of surgery at Howard University School of Medicine, reached the New York Times in an opinion piece and should find its way into the hands of every health-sector leader and elected official:

Expanding primary and preventive care efforts is urgent and long overdue. We should train more health care professionals who have regular contact with patients to conduct primary care services. Imagine going to the dentist or the pharmacy and getting a mammogram or a diabetes screening, in addition to having your teeth cleaned or picking up a prescription. With more trained professionals looking out for patients, we can prevent emerging problems from becoming emergencies.

Access to Care is Survival

Convenience of care is essential to people’s well-being. We read each day of too many seniors and rural Americans struggling to access this nation’s health system. We see the wise moves of public health officials to ensure the continuation of telehealth services and recognize that hybrid care is a step toward integrating in-person with on-screen medical professional relationships. Convenience supports access to care. Access to care is survival.

One of the nation’s more pressing public health threats is now gathering momentum when our front-line medical defense force — primary care — is in retreat. Slowly driven underground by the coding maze, mysterious reimbursement hurdles, physician burnout, and consumer desire for on-demand appointments, primary care is morphing before our eyes into a pharmacy-store service add-on. That change may be the straw that breaks the camel’s back when it comes to the growing threat of prediabetes and other non-communicable illnesses that progress step-by-step from sickness to death. 

Consider the work needed to apply what we have learned during these many months of confronting COVID. It’s evident that people with non-communicable diseases (NCDs) such as cancer, diabetes, heart conditions, obesity and respiratory illnesses — amplified by COVID-19 – are at heightened risk for morbidity and mortality. While we look to tackle inflation and address supply chain challenges, we must revisit and reinvigorate our public health prevention and primary medicine network to engage and intervene around NCDs.

The Prediabetes Epidemic is the Perfect Public Health Storm

The scale of the problem is immense. Approximately 84 million adults — more than 1 in 3 Americans — have prediabetes. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), 90% of people with prediabetes do not know they have it — nor that, left unchecked, it leads to Type 2 diabetes.

Though its symptoms are subtle, prediabetes is not benign. Like elevated blood pressure and high cholesterol, the unseen becomes the deadly.

Further complicating our ability to address this growing threat may be how we define the term “prediabetes.” For most people, prediabetes means, “Whew! I don’t have diabetes.” But prediabetes requires the toughest treatment — a real pledge on the part of the patient to change their behavior. Without a consistent commitment to healthy diet and exercise patterns, they will join an ever-growing community of people with Type 2 diabetes. If a routine medical test raised a red flag that something was precancerous, we would jump into action; a diagnosis of prediabetes can be treated no less seriously.

The Last Part of the Problem is Primary Care Access

Medical school debt — the need to see more patients in a day to make ends meet — has shifted physicians toward higher-paying medical specialties. Physician assistants and nurse practitioners have filled the gaps in front-line patient-care roles. Plus, the Amazon-era “I want it now” consumer mindset is transforming expectations for primary care. The ability to walk into a CVS MinuteClinic, Walgreen DR Walk-In, or Walmart Care Clinic for primary care is a win for patient access. But will ongoing, comprehensive medical needs — a plan for self-care instead of sick care — be tackled?

Today, fewer and fewer people have a long-term family physician who tracks their needs and feels responsible for their longevity. At the same time, the single-practitioner office — like pharma companies and hospitals — is now being “rolled-up” into larger practice groups and private practices are vanishing. At this pace, the discipline will become practically extinct. Yet, without the primary diagnostic oversight provided by a trusted health care provider, we are missing an important strand in the medical safety net between urgent and specialty care — between prevention and illness — between prediabetes and diabetes.

A Perfect Storm

It is a perfect storm. Poorer diet, higher sugar intake, and increasingly sedentary lifestyle are leading to prediabetes, which isn’t straightforward to diagnose and is often not taken seriously by patients. The most important player in defense against the condition — the primary care physician — is beginning to phase out.

Considering how the care market and medical ecosystem are shifting, we have our work cut out for us in getting ahead of this epidemic. We must take on more responsibilities ourselves as patients, armed with the knowledge that one-in-three has prediabetes. We must continue to foster good relationships with healthcare professionals, increasingly with specialists, to fill the role that primary care doctors are leaving vacant. Plus, communication between physician and patient around prediabetes must dial-up, with physicians combining tough love with access to behavioral insights to better understand how to motivate their patients. Both must find a conversational bridge that connects how a stitch in time saves eyesight, peripheral nerves, kidney function, and quality of life.

People with Health Needs are Calling Out Urgently

Dr. Fredrick, as an educator, public health advocate and physician maps out a commonsense and compassionate approach to preventing needless suffering and death — engage! His words must be read again and again by everyone allied to the cause of preventing illness:

The health care industry should also invest more in-patient outreach, communication, and education. Patients should not be required to fully understand their health risks and navigate complicated systems to receive the care they need. Nor should they have to travel far for it. We must create more convenient opportunities for patients to receive health care, especially for those who can’t take time off work or afford transportation. We should expand telemedicine efforts, which are still inaccessible for many minority communities that lack consistent access to the internet. We should also bring mobile health care services into low-income communities, just as we have set up coronavirus testing and vaccination sites across our cities.

A learned medical advisor — whether an in-person physician advocate or one powered by smart technology — who knows our name and knows what’s happening with us over time. It is the best defense we have against prediabetes and other chronic conditions. Even in the changing medical landscape (still struggling to overcome COVID-19 and the unresolved challenges of racism that result in illness), there must always be a place for that relationship. Otherwise, the ticking time bomb of 84 million prediabetic Americans will morph into the next overwhelming public health crisis.

The post America’s Front-line Disease Defense System has Broken Down appeared first on Medika Life.

What is insulin?

Insulin is a hormone made by the pancreas that helps glucose in your blood enter cells in your muscle, fat, and liver, where it’s used for energy. Glucose comes from the food you eat. The liver also makes glucose in times of need, such as when you’re fasting. When blood glucose, also called blood sugar, levels rise after you eat, your pancreas releases insulin into the blood. Insulin then lowers blood glucose to keep it in the normal range.

What is insulin resistance?

Insulin resistance is when cells in your muscles, fat, and liver don’t respond well to insulin and can’t easily take up glucose from your blood. As a result, your pancreas makes more insulin to help glucose enter your cells. As long as your pancreas can make enough insulin to overcome your cells’ weak response to insulin, your blood glucose levels will stay in the healthy range.

What is prediabetes?

Prediabetes means your blood glucose levels are higher than normal but not high enough to be diagnosed as diabetes. Prediabetes usually occurs in people who already have some insulin resistance or whose beta cells in the pancreas aren’t making enough insulin to keep blood glucose in the normal range. Without enough insulin, extra glucose stays in your bloodstream rather than entering your cells. Over time, you could develop type 2 diabetes.

How common is prediabetes?

More than 84 million people ages 18 and older have prediabetes in the United States. That’s about 1 out of every 3 adults.

Who is more likely to develop insulin resistance or prediabetes?

People who have genetic or lifestyle risk factors are more likely to develop insulin resistance or prediabetes. Risk factors include

• overweight or obesity
• age 45 or older
• a parent, brother, or sister with diabetes
• African American, Alaska Native, American Indian, Asian American, Hispanic/Latino, Native Hawaiian, or Pacific Islander American ethnicity
• physical inactivity
• health conditions such as high blood pressure and abnormal cholesterol levels
• a history of gestational diabetes
• a history of heart disease or stroke
• polycystic ovary syndrome, also called PCOS

People who have metabolic syndrome—a combination of high blood pressure, abnormal cholesterol levels, and large waist size—are more likely to have prediabetes.

Along with these risk factors, other things that may contribute to insulin resistance include

• certain medicines, such as glucocorticoids , some antipsychotics, and some medicines for HIV
• hormonal disorders, such as Cushing’s syndrome and acromegaly
• sleep problems, especially sleep apnea

Although you can’t change risk factors such as family history, age, or ethnicity, you can change lifestyle risk factors around eating, physical activity, and weight. These lifestyle changes can lower your chances of developing insulin resistance or prediabetes.

What causes insulin resistance and prediabetes?

Researchers don’t fully understand what causes insulin resistance and prediabetes, but they think excess weight and lack of physical activity are major factors.

Excess weight

Experts believe obesity, especially too much fat in the abdomen and around the organs, called visceral fat, is a main cause of insulin resistance. A waist measurement of 40 inches or more for men and 35 inches or more for women is linked to insulin resistance. This is true even if your body mass index (BMI) falls within the normal range. However, research has shown that Asian Americans may have an increased risk for insulin resistance even without a high BMI.

Researchers used to think that fat tissue was only for energy storage. However, studies have shown that belly fat makes hormones and other substances that can contribute to chronic, or long-lasting, inflammation in the body. Inflammation may play a role in insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease.

Excess weight may lead to insulin resistance, which in turn may play a part in the development of fatty liver disease.

Physical inactivity

Not getting enough physical activity is linked to insulin resistance and prediabetes. Regular physical activity causes changes in your body that make it better able to keep your blood glucose levels in balance.

What are the symptoms of insulin resistance and prediabetes?

Insulin resistance and prediabetes usually have no symptoms. Some people with prediabetes may have darkened skin in the armpit or on the back and sides of the neck, a condition called acanthosis nigricans. Many small skin growths called skin tags often appear in these same areas.

Even though blood glucose levels are not high enough to cause symptoms for most people, a few research studies have shown that some people with prediabetes may already have early changes in their eyes that can lead to retinopathy. This problem more often occurs in people with diabetes.

How do doctors diagnose insulin resistance and prediabetes?

Doctors use blood tests to find out if someone has prediabetes, but they don’t usually test for insulin resistance. The most accurate test for insulin resistance is complicated and used mostly for research.

Doctors most often use the fasting plasma glucose (FPG) test or the A1C test to diagnose prediabetes. Less often, doctors use the oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT), which is more expensive and not as easy to give.

The A1C test reflects your average blood glucose over the past 3 months. The FPG and OGTT show your blood glucose level at the time of the test. The A1C test is not as sensitive as the other tests. In some people, it may miss prediabetes that the OGTT could catch. The OGTT can identify how your body handles glucose after a meal—often before your fasting blood glucose level becomes abnormal. Often doctors use the OGTT to check for gestational diabetes, a type of diabetes that develops during pregnancy.

People with prediabetes have up to a 50 percent chance of developing diabetes over the next 5 to 10 years. You can take steps to manage your prediabetes and prevent type 2 diabetes.

The following test results show Prediabetes

• A1C—5.7 to 6.4 percent
• FPG—100 to 125 mg/dL (milligrams per deciliter)
• OGTT—140 to 199 mg/dL

You should be tested for prediabetes if you are overweight or have obesity and have one or more other risk factors for diabetes, or if your parents, siblings, or children have type 2 diabetes. Even if you don’t have risk factors, you should start getting tested once you reach age 45.

If the results are normal but you have other risk factors for diabetes, you should be retested at least every 3 years.

How can I prevent or reverse insulin resistance and prediabetes?

Physical activity and losing weight if you need to may help your body respond better to insulin. Taking small steps, such as eating healthier foods and moving more to lose weight, can help reverse insulin resistance and prevent or delay type 2 diabetes in people with prediabetes.

The National Institutes of Health-funded research study, the Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP), showed that for people at high risk of developing diabetes, losing 5 to 7 percent of their starting weight helped reduce their chance of developing the disease.³ That’s 10 to 14 pounds for someone who weighs 200 pounds. People in the study lost weight by changing their diet and being more physically active.

The DPP also showed that taking metformin, a medicine used to treat diabetes, could delay diabetes. Metformin worked best for women with a history of gestational diabetes, younger adults, and people with obesity. Ask your doctor if metformin might be right for you.

Making a plan, tracking your progress, and getting support from your health care professional, family, and friends can help you make lifestyle changes that may prevent or reverse insulin resistance and prediabetes. You may be able to take part in a lifestyle change program as part of the National Diabetes Prevention Program [External link].

Clinical Trials

The National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) and other components of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) conduct and support research into many diseases and conditions.

What are clinical trials, and are they right for you?

Clinical trials are part of clinical research and at the heart of all medical advances. Clinical trials look at new ways to prevent, detect, or treat disease. Researchers also use clinical trials to look at other aspects of care, such as improving the quality of life for people with chronic illnesses. Find out if clinical trials are right for you [External Link]

What clinical trials are open?

Clinical trials that are currently open and are recruiting can be viewed at www.ClinicalTrials.gov [External Link].

This article has been reproduced in part from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. Visit their site for more detailed information on assistance with Diabetes within the U.S.

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