X-PERT course

dear sleepy thanks for the offer but please dont wake me !!

sleepyu

I've not had been on the X-PERT couse, but I how ever been on the DAFNE course for T1 diabetics, which is a pretty similar course...

I found it brillient, as at no time where we told how many carbs we should eat, nor were we even told to eat plenty of carbs with every meal... (which in 20 years of diabetes I've never had any one actually say this to me!)

What we were taught on the course, was what a carb was, the different guises you could find it, and how a carb or a mixture of different carbs could effect your BG's

We were also given information on our diabetes, which other factors such as stress, illness, exercise etc could impact on our BG's and ways of combating this...

We were also given guidence on how to interpretate our results, what blood tests we should have and what the results of these meant...

The out come of the course, was the ability to make a informed choice, we were able to build our own diets that suited us as a individual and the ability to do this and maintain good control...

Hi Sleepyloo
Where did you find those low carb buns?

sleepylu said:

..... suggested i go on the local 6 x 2 hr XPERT course.
Has anyone experienced the course?

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Can I resurrect this thread? I was diagnosed T2 in May (HbA1c 47mmol/mol), told to contact the local organisers for this and have a place on a course starting in September. In other words, I'll have had 4 months of trying to teach myself as much as possible by the time I get on the course, so I'm wondering what I'll make of it. Any positive experiences, anyone?

Does it deal solely with diabetes? When I rang to book I was told it was a general course on illness, medication, lifestyle and stress. Since I'm not ill, not on medication (apart from the ubiquitous aspirin), not worried about my lifestyle and not stressed atm, I declined. Worth double-checking on yours?

DeejayR said:

Does it deal solely with diabetes? When I rang to book I was told it was a general course on illness, medication, lifestyle and stress. ..... Worth double-checking on yours?

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It's called the X-PERT Diabetes programme, so have they described it inappropriately to you? It's 6 sessions:

1. What is diabetes
2. Weight management
3. Carb awareness
4. Food management
5. Complications
6. Are you an X-PERT?

JenniferW said:

It's called the X-PERT Diabetes programme

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Ah, I see what's happened. I was referred to EXPERT (not X-Pert) at this website http://selfmanagementuk.org/. X-PERT is indeed a diabetes help course run by that organisation.
I wrote to my surgery explaining why I had declined but got no answer, which is not surprising since they probably didn't know about it. The letter inviting me to arrange to attend a course was from an outside agency.
I hope you find it useful.

DeejayR said:

Ah, I see what's happened. I was referred to EXPERT (not X-Pert) .....

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Makes you wonder what they thought they were doing - good job it wasn't more serious?

I didn't even realise there was one until i read abiut it on the forum - I've been T2 for about 2 years and it has never been suggested that I go on one!! I was offered a place on a DESMOND course last year but I declined on the basis that I had already managed to find what I considered to be all of the relevant information.

I took up the offer of the place on the X-PERT course as soon as I was told about it because I assume I'll get a better picture of what resources I can actually tap into in the NHS. But I'm realistic. For many years I've been involved with the care of a member of the family with Alzheimer's, and left to the NHS, it would have been even more difficult than it has been. The Alzheimer's Society have been the people who've really helped, and I assume Diabetes UK (and this website) is going to be the same sort of thing as regards my diabetes.

I attended the six week X pert course and found it very useful and informative. I can't remember how I got on it though, I think it was while seeing nurse someone else was there and asked me if I want to go on it and glad I did.

I did the X-PERT course a couple of months after my T2 diagnosis last year and went along suspecting I wasn't going to learn much new. In fact I did learn new things, and the time spent going over things I already knew was more valuable than I expected. But most important, the face-to-face contact with a group of other people dealing with the same (and worse) problems was the big bonus. At times we learnt as much from each other as from the person teaching us.

The people who run the course are not part of the mainstream NHS diabetes teams, so they can be a bit more balanced, and don't try to push just ONE diet, ONE approach. As the sessions progressed, I realised we were all being taught enough to enable us to carb count intelligently, taking on board your own diet habits and working out what was going to be sustainable for the long, long term. As it's free, I think you'd be daft not to take up the offer of a place - and don't judge it too hastily.

DeejayR said:

Ah, I see what's happened. I was referred to EXPERT (not X-Pert) at this website http://selfmanagementuk.org/. X-PERT is indeed a diabetes help course run by that organisation.
I wrote to my surgery explaining why I had declined but got no answer, which is not surprising since they probably didn't know about it. The letter inviting me to arrange to attend a course was from an outside agency.
I hope you find it useful.

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I did the X-PERT course, then heard about the EXPERT one but couldn't because E. Lancs didn't run one and ouldn't allow me to go to the one 10 miles away at Bury (where my hospital was!) so i did it "distance learning". A while later I volunteered to be a " mentor" on their courses, and they refused me as they only recognised the "face to face" courses!