During intensive care, hyperglycaemia and insulin resistance are widespread in diabetics as well as non-diabetics. However, whether the normalisation of blood glucose levels with insulin therapy improves the prognosis of such patients is still debated. Karoline Laarmann reports
To face the national and worldwide increase in diabetes mellitus cases, the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research initiated the foundation of the German Centre for Diabetes Research (DZD), aiming to improve basic research, prevention, diagnostic and therapy of diabetes. Inaugurated in Berlin a few months ago, the centre has five strategic partners.
Much of the newly revealed variation in amputation rates in England is due to many diabetics not receiving nine key care processes, including checks on weight, blood pressure, blood glucose, cholesterol, urine and, in particular, consistent foot care checks.
Although there is still disagreement as to ‘how’, when it comes to the question of whether the glucose level affects the prognosis for intensive care patients, the answer is a definite ‘yes’. ‘
Bedside testing of parameters has been introduced in clinical practice much earlier than laboratory testing: In past centuries, not only were temperature or pulse rate taken at the point of care (POC), but also qualitative blood or urine analysis were performed right next to a patient’s bed
In November, European diabetologists converged on Leverkusen, Germany, to discuss current practices in diabetic management of Type 1 and Type 2 in adults, as well as new technologies, procedures and the need for patients’ education.
Innumerable studies (e.g. Ceriello A., et. al. 2006) have shown that postprandial hyperglycaemia is an independent risk factor for cardiovascular disease (CVD) in all populations. In diabetics, according to IDF figures, CVD is even the major cause of death (some 50 % of all diabetes fatalities) and much disability. ‘Therefore, the primary goal in diabetes treatment should be not only lowering…
Diabetics can face a five times increase in the risk of developing cardiovascular disease (CVD) than non-diabetics. This leads to a seven to ten year reduction in life expectancy and a higher probability of suffering a fatal heart attack. These sad statistics have prompted the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) to mark World Diabetes Day on 14 November by emphasising the simple measures that…
7,000 people from 120 countries met in Stockholm this September to hear international experts discuss the progress, solutions and challenges of one of our greatest healthcare burdens. Prevention, self-monitoring, surgery, guidelines, economic problems, drug-safety, and co-morbidities – these are just a few of the problems associated with the care of about 55 million diabetics in Europe.
A new obesity measurement for the 21st Century, which can help identify individuals at risk of illness such as heart disease, strokes and diabetes, has been officially launched this week. The Body Volume Index (BVI), designed by Select Research, uses a 3D white-light scanner to calculate risk factors associated with a person's body shape and type, through analysis of weight and body fat…
A nurse-initiated, nurse-led, and nurse-implemented study shows that nurses taking charge of diabetes care in hospital results in more patients hitting their target glucose levels. The study was led by Esther Boteach, Soroka University Medical Center Beer-Sheva, Israel, and co-workers.
Professor Claes-Göran Östenson, chair of the Local Organising Committee of the 46th European Association for the Study of Diabetes annual meeting, will welcome visitors in this the bicentenary year of the renowned Nobel-prize giving Karolinska Institute. Since its foundation in 1965, the EASD annual meeting has become the world’s largest international annual conference on diabetes research,…
Does diabetes further increase the risk of death in patients diagnosed with cancer? A team at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland, has discovered something very sobering: Cancer patients are 51% to 85% more likely to die after surgical resection if they had pre-existing diabetes.
Recently, the prevalence of diabetes mellitus in the Czech Republic reached 7-8% (783,321 diabetics were treated last year – 419,362 females and 363,959 males) but this figure leaps to 25-30% for diabetes related hospitalisations.
Researchers have identified 12 new genes associated with Type 2 diabetes (T2D) that look set to improve the understanding of the processes underpinning the condition. The findings could also offer new biological pathways that can be explored as targets for new therapies to tackle T2D.
Finland’s national programme for the prevention of Type 2 diabetes (T2D) has already seen a significant sector of the population making meaningful lifestyle changes, while work is also progressing on Type 1 diabetes research in children.
Dr Susan S Braithwaite, a visiting clinical professor in endocrinology at the Department of Medicine, University of Illinois, Chicago, specialises in the management of hyperglycaemia among hospitalised patients. Hyperglycaemia, the presence of an abnormally high concentration of glucose in the blood, is a common occurrence in adults who are hospital in-patients, especially among diabetic…
Drug company Novo Nordisk’s decision to pull its Mixtard 30 insulin drug from the UK could add almost €11 million to the NHS drugs bill in England alone, according to an editorial in the Drug and Therapeutics Bulletin (DTB). This decision could also leave thousands of patients dependent on others to help them take their insulin, said DTB, as it launched its Don’t Drop Mixtard 30 campaign in…
When Swiss orthopaedic surgeon Dr Marino Delmi, Past-President of the Swiss Foot & Ankle Society, Member of the Council of the European Foot & Ankle Society, and of the Scientific Foot & Ankle Council of the European Federation of National Associations of Orthopaedics and Traumatology (EFORT), met with other experts in the field, three critical diabetes topics were explored.
People suffering from diabetes-related foot ulcers show different rates of healing according to the way they cope and their psychological state of mind, according to new research by a health psychologist at The University of Nottingham, UK. The large study published in the journal Diabetologia has shown that the way patients cope with the condition and their levels of depression, affect how the…
The daily management of diabetes mellitus is a complex interaction between blood glucose measuring, lifestyle aspects and drug therapy. Large epidemiological trials such as UKPDS (United Kingdom Diabetes Prospective Study) have shown that an optimal blood glucose adjustment has beneficial long-term effects on type-2 diabetics’ risk of micro- and macrovascular secondary complications.
Diabetes mellitus is a lingering disease – for a long time it causes subjectively few complaints or no complaints at all. Despite this, it is life-threatening – especially if undiagnosed, or diagnosed too late. However, although diabetes is the most widespread disease it is often only discovered by accident in a hospital, where many hospital doctors feel that diabetology is the responsibility…
At the end of June a shocking new estimate was released in the UK regarding the number of people unwittingly going about their lives without knowing they are type 2 diabetics – there are just over a million of them. How will the country cope with this discovery and its present diabetic population?
An adequate blood glucose level (4–7 mmol/l) is important not only for a diabetic’s daily well-being but also to prevent diabetes-related illnesses. HbA1c is the central marker to evaluate the success of diabetes management. But HbA1c measurement has a crucial limitation: current blood glucose fluctuations are not taken into consideration. However, the recognition of steep post-prandial blood…
A new method to produce insulin cheaply has been developed by researchers at the Helmholtz-Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig, in a German-Indo collaboration. The group’s results are published in the open access online research magazine Microbial Cell Factories. The data is freely accessible by anyone and is not subject to patent law.