The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Diabetes drive to target a million city residents

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Feb 09, 2005

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Diabetes drive to target a million city residents

By Our Staff Reporter

CHENNAI, FEB. 8. A multi-pronged diabetes prevention campaign involving public education, screening camps and lifestyle counselling launched in September last year is on schedule to reach out to a million residents in the city in three years.

Billed as the first exercise of its scale in the world, the Prevention, Awareness, Counselling and Evaluation (PACE) project was launched by the Madras Diabetes Research Foundation (MDRF) and Dr. Mohans' M. V. Diabetes Specialities Centre with the financial support of the Chennai Willingdon Corporate Foundation. Since its launch on September 24, 2004, PACE has screened 13,005 persons who visited the 29 free diabetes camps it conducted across the city.

V. Mohan, chairman of the Dr. Mohans' M.V. Diabetes Specialities Centre, told a press conference that within the time frame, it was expected to screen close to 2 lakh residents, exceeding the 50,000 target.

Of those who attended the camps, 2,271 were known diabetics, 584 persons were diagnosed for the first time and 1,084 identified as borderline status who would require detailed investigations to confirm diabetes mellitus, said Rekha Thankappan, Executive Director of the centre.

PACE volunteers also conducted 43 awareness camps, which included lectures by diabetologists, ophthalmologists and dieticians apart from consultation for diabetes and associated complications.

The campaign has been highlighting the message that diabetes is preventable, the importance of catching it early and preventing complications. People across age groups are encouraged to eat less and walk more and diabetic patients taught that achieving good control of the disorder is worthwhile.

The campaign has reached out schools and colleges, Government offices, banks and industries. Women have also been a focus group in the integrated Information, Education, Communication plan.

The educational material for the campaign includes pamphlets (in English and Tamil), posters, lectures, seminars, compact discs and television appeals.

Training course

An important component of the PACE project involves training of a pool of 500 general practitioners (GPs) on a three-day course in diabetology. So far, three batches comprising 62 GPs have been trained on the latest methods in management of diabetes and related complications of the eye, foot, kidneys and nerves.

PACE will also designate four residential colonies belonging to the middle- income group in Chennai for implementing a primary preventive programme in the community modelled on the Diabetes Prevention Programme in the U.S.

Van donated

The Chennai Willingdon Corporate Foundation today donated a van to help MDRF to reach out to more people and implement mass awareness and screening programmes. The Director of the Foundation, V. Narayanan, handed over the keys to Dr. V. Mohan and Rema Mohan.

The three-year PACE programme is a sequel to an earlier MDRF-piloted diabetes survey in 2001 which found that 16 per cent of the sample population of 26,001 was affected by diabetes. Among the findings of the Chennai Urban Rural Epidemiology Study were that 25 per cent had never heard of diabetes while only 22 per cent recognised that the disorder was preventable.

The study also found that only 11.8 per cent attributed obesity and physical inactivity as a cause of diabetes while more than half the surveyed population was unaware of the complications of the disorder.

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