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Latest Article from BBC on Diabetes bill

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Ehlana

Active Member
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Morning all,

I was quite shocked with this article from the bbc this morning - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-19259795, about the bill topping £40m.

When is NHS going to learn that the advice they are dishing out really doesn't work?

Until I started restricting my carbs, my diabetes continued to deteriorate - the low fat, high starchy carb diets that are peddled by the dieticians shot my HB1c into double figures.

It was only when I went over to Europe to live for a while that I got a different opinion - one that I have followed ever since.

Many people trust what their doctor/diabetic nurse is telling them - yet simple changes can improve their health.

Rant over..... :oops:
 
I totally agree with you. Diabetes care and subsequent development of severe complications, in the Uk is abysmal
Hana
 
Paul_c said:
Ehlana said:
Morning all,

I was quite shocked with this article from the bbc this morning - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-19259795, about the bill topping £40m.
Click to expand...

slight correction to the above, that's not the cost, that's the number of prescriptions written... the actual cost is far greater.
Click to expand...
I am not sure if this is entirely coreect or not but my old GP told me once that the pharmacists are paid by he prescription and not the individual items.
This may have changed but it was reinforced by the local chemists rying o rationalise repeat prescriptons {they wanted the contract for the new Health Centre}. so that all the items could be prescribed at the dsame time.
This is not as easy as it might sound for various reasons which anyone on multiple meds will realise but others might not.
The Drs practice made no attempt o enforce this hemselves.
if this were the case in any way then reducing the number of prescripions might be worth looking into further.

Another Dr I knew used o publish figures on his waiting room walls abou the reduced number of prescripionnns issued by him for each quarter.

I would be very interested o learmn how Baroness Young intends o "preven " T2 diabetes, I do hope we don't get an "awareness " campaign. I hink it might make me very angry and hat won't be good for my blood sugar!
 
it's almost a certainty that the food lobby will stick their oar in and insist on an awareness campaign with calories in and out being the guidelines... they'll do everything they can to avoid the finger of blame being pointed at them for making the food so addictive with high sugars and cynically using the "low-fat" label as a means of conning people into thinking their carb laden product is healthy...
 
Paul_c said:
slight correction to the above, that's not the cost, that's the number of prescriptions written... the actual cost is far greater.
Click to expand...


If this is the case then it's understandable. The rise in people developing diabetes in this 6 year time period aside, up until a few years ago my gp surgery were more than happy to prescribe my insulin and consumables for many months ahead, now they'll only prescribe one box of insulin at a time and only enough test strips to last 4 weeks, I can understand that they want to reduce waste (i.e people throwing away unused tablets) but for people like like myself who are insulin dependant they could reduce the bill by prescribing drugs for longer periods.
 
According to the article in the Daily Mail, the prescriptions have risen to 40 million and the cos to £760.3 million and accounts for 10% of of the overall bill for drugs prescribed. It says 90% of sufferers are Type 2 with 2.8 million sufferers on GP books. There's the usual blah about being overweight, healthy eating, genetic links and more exercise.

Of course, while we cost the NHS a large sum of money overall, I wonder how much we've paid in taxes etc towards our health care while various trusts now want to deny us the means to control our diabetes via test strips which could help us reduce our medication and reduce their costs in the long term.
 
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