On diabetes and patient education
From my facebook:
In the mission of piling more stuff on my plate for this semester, I co-presented a diabetes education workshop (through the American Diabetes Association) this morning. It's interesting what people do and don't know (or know but don't remember) about this condition, even if they themselves have it or someone in their immediate family has it. If I really am determined to be a CDE, I feel I'm going to be repeating these same warnings/teachings ad nauseum."
I really wanted to post every day in October, but I'm already behind since I didn't get to finish writing and posting this yesterday. Oh well, the beauty of backdating.
The diabetes workshop was in Crown Heights, an area that, even if you weren't from Brooklyn or the greater New York City area, most people know as being on the rough side. The senior center was on the second floor of one of the project buildings, which made it even trickier to find. The seniors we spoke and met yesterday were incredibly gracious and charming though. They didn't have too many questions, but just wanted to share their own diabetes stories of their friends and family. One lady's son went into a diabetic coma and passed away when he was in his thirties. His blood sugar when he was admitted into the ED was in the 900s, she said. The blood glucose levels of a non-diabetic adult, in comparison, is 70-100 mg/dL. Insane.
In the mission of piling more stuff on my plate for this semester, I co-presented a diabetes education workshop (through the American Diabetes Association) this morning. It's interesting what people do and don't know (or know but don't remember) about this condition, even if they themselves have it or someone in their immediate family has it. If I really am determined to be a CDE, I feel I'm going to be repeating these same warnings/teachings ad nauseum."
I really wanted to post every day in October, but I'm already behind since I didn't get to finish writing and posting this yesterday. Oh well, the beauty of backdating.
The diabetes workshop was in Crown Heights, an area that, even if you weren't from Brooklyn or the greater New York City area, most people know as being on the rough side. The senior center was on the second floor of one of the project buildings, which made it even trickier to find. The seniors we spoke and met yesterday were incredibly gracious and charming though. They didn't have too many questions, but just wanted to share their own diabetes stories of their friends and family. One lady's son went into a diabetic coma and passed away when he was in his thirties. His blood sugar when he was admitted into the ED was in the 900s, she said. The blood glucose levels of a non-diabetic adult, in comparison, is 70-100 mg/dL. Insane.