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What is a secondary diabetes prevention program and what is involved in implementing one?
Now, more than ever, effective diabetes prevention programs are essential to managing the growing epidemic of diabetes. Recent news out of Ontario points to a startling escalation in the prevalence of diabetes, far exceeding World Health Organization predictions for 2030. Currently, more than two million people in Canada have diabetes. This figure is expected to rise to at least three million by 2010. Four out of five of these people will the of heart disease.
Type 1 diabetes, which affects approximately 10% of people with diabetes, occurs when the body makes little or no insulin. It used to be called insulin-dependent or juvenile diabetes. Type 2 diabetes, which affects the overwhelming majority of people with diabetes, is a disease in which the pancreas does not produce enough insulin, or the body does not properly use the insulin it makes.
The life-threatening complications of diabetes may be prevented or delayed through prevention and early diagnosis. The incidence of diabetes is higher in certain ethnic populations such as people of Aboriginal, Hispanic, Asian, South Asian or African descent.
Clearly, diabetes is a major public health risk of which every registered nurse should be aware, and for which he or she should be prepared to assume a prevention-oriented role.
Types of Diabetes Prevention
There are three types of diabetes prevention:
* primary prevention,
* secondary prevention, and
* tertiary prevention.
Primary prevention focuses on activities aimed at preventing diabetes from occurring in susceptible people or populations by modifying environment and changing risk factors. An example of this is preventing smoking by prohibiting smoking in public places.
Secondary prevention is where registered nurses can play a major role and it involves early detection of the disease to prevent, delay or minimize complications. This includes identifying people whose blood sugar approaches a diabetic level and implementing interventions to stop it from becoming full-blown. The 2004 Auditor General's Report on Preventing and Managing Diabetes in British Columbia indicated that research elsewhere has shown the value of secondary prevention programs for diabetes, but that no organized secondary prevention program existed in British Columbia.
Tertiary prevention is defined as the measures undertaken to prevent, delay or minimize...