Diabetes course to halt predicted pandemic

A diabetes charity has launched a new programme to help people at risk of Type 2 diabetes from developing the condition, after predictions that a diabetes pandemic could reach one in 10 UK adults by 2030.

X-PERT Health’s X-POD programme will help people with impaired fasting glucose, impaired glucose tolerance or a raised diabetes risk score to reduce their risk of developing Type 2 diabetes – ideally, preventing it completely.

The six-week education course will encourage participants to adopt a healthier diet, increase physical activity, as well as encouraging heightened awareness of the effects their lifestyles can have on their health.

Diabetes currently takes up 10 per cent of the NHS budget – with £1m spent on diabetes every hour – but this is projected to rise to £16.9 billion over the next 25 years, or 17 per cent of the health service’s funds.. People diagnosed with the preventable Type 2 diabetes at age 40 face a reduction in life expectancy of eight years.

Dr Trudi Deakin, chief executive of X-PERT Health said: “X-POD will be offered free of charge through the NHS to anyone at risk of developing Type 2 diabetes – for healthcare bodies, it’s a cost effective education programme that could reverse the Type 2 diabetes prevalence statistics and transform the health of the nation.”

A clinical trial carried out in Finland, involving 522 people, showed not one new case of diabetes in three years among those who achieved four or five of the diabetes prevention goals.