Finding a real world solution for diabetes

Professor James Dunbar from the Greater Green Triangle University Department of Rural Health, a joint venture of Deakin and Flinders Universities based in Warrnambool, has won a major National Health and Medical Research Council grant to help provide real world solutions to the critical health and social problems caused by diabetes.

“It’s a great honour to win an award like this,” Professor Dunbar said. “It’s also pleasing that we are able to work on a project the aim of which is to provide a real world solution in the area of diabetes.

“The dramatic increase in the prevalence of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is posing a major health problem world wide. In Australia, the prevalence of T2DM has more than doubled, while the total number of cases has increased threefold in an ageing population, almost one million.

“As well as the health issue, this creates an enormous economic burden, predicted to be around $7 billion by 2033, unless we can come up with better systems of recognising people at risk and helping to prevent them getting diabetes.

“We need to find comprehensive ways of dealing with diabetes within a price range that the health services can afford.

“For example, we have had a lot of randomised programs that have been trialled.

“One of those in the United States cost $190 million for 3000 people. You can’t reproduce that in the health care sector.

“What this NHMRC grant will allow us to do is evaluate the Life! Taking Action on Diabetes Program that has been set up throughout Victoria.”

Life! is a Primary Care based lifestyle behaviour change program for 25,000 Victorians aged 50 years and over who have been identified as a high risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

The evaluation of it by Professor Dunbar and his team at Greater Green Triangle will focus on two aspects – the improvement of the health of the participants and the economics.

“The economic appraisal is designed to answer two key questions,” Professor Dunbar said.

“The first is should the Life! program be rolled out across Australia based on the Victorian experience and the second is what is the most effective way to do that?

“Given the size of the problems we are confronting with diabetes, this is a highly significant project, one with immediate links to health policy.

“The Council of Australian Governments (COAG) has on its agenda the prevention of progression to diabetes among those people who are at high risk.

“The results of this study, including the economic evaluation information, will be required for development of an effective policy over the next decade.”

For more information: www.diabeteslife.org.au

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