jopar said:
I've been frequently my diabetic clinic for over 20 years now, and can't remember seeing anybody who's lost limbs etc...
Before I was diagnosed (3 months ago), I knew precisely three T2 diabetics, two of whom had legs amputated, one of of whom has severe retinopathy. T2 diabetics absolutely do suffer from diabetes related complications. This is not scaremongering, it's a medically established fact (and there are very few of those around when it comes to diabetes).
The statistics for amplutation is 5,000 operations a week, so a percentage of this will be individuals who face a second amplutatution, the T1 I know had her toes removed in 5 different operations not in a single one! But even if you take these figures as first time then as there are over 2.4 million diabetics the actual percentage is very small indeed, so who is scaremongering!
jopar said:
So the moral of the story, is that more people get into problems because they don't listen to what is being said to them.. because at the end of the day how to we learn what we need to enable us to take control, make decissions if we don't listen...
As a recently diagnosed diabetic, it seems to me that exactly the reverse is true. It's the people who don't listen to what they are told, and make informed decisions of their own, who are the ones that manage to keep their blood sugars under control.
If I'd listened to my GP, a disgraceful NHS dietician and tried to follow the advice given by the Diabetes.org.uk "eating well guide", then I'd be including a third of a plate full of starchy carbohydrates with every meal, and be at the start of a one way trip to the amputation clinic.
I'm lucky enough to be educated and web-savvy enough to have worked my own way through the minefield of bad advice, but in the early weeks my head was spinning.
There are certainly some people that will suffer the consequences of their own apathy about their condition, but I absolutely do not accept that every T2 diabetic that suffers complications, does so because they did not listen to advice.