Diabetes is a ticking bomb

The head of the Lebanese Association of Diabetes, Dr. Mohammed Sandid confirmed that "diabetes is the new tsunami, and a time bomb that threatens the lives of many people”. He said current awareness programmes were not sufficient to educate patients. Arabstoday interviewed Dr. Sandid about diabetes, the goals of his association and his latest studies: AT: What are the latest statistics of the number of people with diabetes? MS: Diabetes is one of the most common diseases in the world, with almost 300 million people and this could be doubled by the year 2025 as per WHO studies that mentioned most new cases will be in developing countries. AT: What about Lebanese history with the diabetes? MS: There are national programmes that have been affected by the United Nations reforms in 2007, and Lebanon was one of the signatories. We started our programmes with a strategic plan including awareness, training and cure to control the disease. Currently we are preparing for a national health survey for diabetes patients to provide the necessary treatment especially, insulin. AT: It is said that there has been a decline in the rate of health treatment, who is to be blamed? MS: There is no doubt that everyone is responsible, especially the media for broadcasting many wrong or confusing ways for treatments that lead the patient to quit out of monotony. We were surprised in Lebanon with some studies that showed that we are on average nine years behind establishing the correct treatment. AT: How would you rate patients’ awareness? MS: Treatment is developed and become more accessible to all patients, and there is awareness of dietary habits, exercise, cholesterol rates control, triglycerides in the blood, weight control , blood pressure, the harms of smoking etc. All of these factors affect health. It’s considered an easy disease to manage if the patient follows all the guidelines. AT: What are the objectives and the new plans of your association? MS: The main objective is to reduce the prolificity of the disease, and this is the responsibility of all parties, from the finance ministry for controllinfg the food  market to the Ministry of Works that has to provide the maximum number of places allocated to sports and physical activity. We also have to increase the awareness programmes in schools so that children get used to healthy food.  We also aim to improve the quality of healthcare, such as introducing oral medication. AT: How efficiently do you think you can achieve those plans? MS: From my experience in this field, I can say there is hope...but I admit there's a significant shortage of awareness and educational programmes. AT: Explain the effect of the dieseas on patients  MS: Many patients get frustrated because of the fear of the disease itself. They start collecting information from unqualified sources and therein starts the role of the psychiatrist or therapist. Convincing them that they can live normally, especially females who think the disease can destroy their marital life is a task. There are many wrong beliefs that have to be eliminated. AT: When we can expect the first workshops?  MS: There is a workshop on May 25 and 26 that will be dedicated to diabetes, it will include experts and doctors from 22 countries as well as 12 Lebanese specialists. The first day will be dedicated to research and discuss the focus of the programme, as well as a workshop for journalists. It also includes a social programme to know how to deal with the patients and the prisoners who have the disease. The second day will be a scientific workshop with various aspects of diabetes in terms of scientific and modern statistics. We invite anyone to give us assistance or help as we all have to support our country to control this disease. AT: What would you like to say to the patients? MS: We owe you a lot and we haven’t succeeded in many of our goals yet, but we will keep trying.