Next, an interview published in OK Diario to our dear companion Óscar López de Briñas (the sugary Jedi), Óscar is a Bilbao Diabetes disseminator known for his bold job for making this pathology visible and pursuing research in new therapies.
The main topics discussed in the interview are:
* How to live with type 1 diabetes, a chronic disease.
* The importance of education and training in diabetes management.
* The need to be an organized and well informed to be able to manage the necessary medication and food.
* The importance of patient associations and emotional support they can provide.
* The emotional impact of the disease and the need to seek psychological help if necessary.
* The resources available on the Internet to learn about diabetes.
I highlight the importance of education and training to be able to handle diabetes properly and how they can be obtained through medical team, patient associations and internet resources.
Oksalud has spoken with López de Briñas about a disease that, although the different treatments have been improved, it remains, as the International Federation of Diabetes (FID) assures a world health problem that must be attached.
In this sense, new figures have been published that show that 537 million adults currently live with diabetes worldwide;It is an increase of 16% (74 million) from the previous estimates made by the FID in 2019. The 10th edition of the Atlas of the FID diabetes, which will be published on December 6, reveals that there are about 5.1 millionAdults in Spain who live with diabetes.This means that the number of people with diabetes has increased in Spain by 42% since 2019.
Ask-.Perhaps we should start talking about how it coexists with a disease as it is in its case type 1 diabetes.
Answer-.Let's say that type 1 diabetes does not prevent you from doing anything, but forces you to foresee everything.From the moment we are the ones who emulate and replace the pancreas in their function of releasing insulin, we have to be calculating the activity we are going to do, what we are going to eat and what we estimate that we can need to spend energy in our day to our dayday.That requires being an organized, organized ... and empowered.Being well formed and educated in diabetes is very important.
P-.How can you help solve that first information when a doctor tells you that you have diabetes?
A.- When I started in 1986 with my type 1 diabetes I had no internet.And I had to learn about diabetes living with her.Today we have a therapeutic approach that, from minute one, affects the formation of the patient.Because, unlike the rest of the diseases, we handle the medication we need at will.That is why knowing is so important.But thanks to the education we receive from the medical team, to the work of the associations and the enormous potential of the network we can empower ourselves a lot.
But the emotional impact of a chronic disease is powerful.And that may require the help of other people with your very pathology (something that associations do), or even the psychological approach in certain cases.
P-.Then other very important contents will come such as learning to eat, which is so fundamental and seek a new balance in your life.
R-.Learning to feed properly is something so important that we should all instruct ourselves from the school itself, we have diabetes or not, since an incorrect food is demonstrated that it is related to a multitude of health problems.But in diabetes having knowledge about nutrition is important to better manage those insulin calculations that we must do every time we are going to eat something.In that, both our medical team and the associations or even the resources that the network gives are important to learn everything you need to know.
P-.When the disease is diagnosed, where should the patient be directed to extract the greatest number of data that helps him face his day to day?
R-.Without any doubt, regardless of the aid that your medical team (endocrine and diabetes educator) must give you, patient associations are the perfect place to go to receive not only educational content but also an emotional help with which to giveCount that you are not alone and that with adequate education you can do what you propose.Apart from ESO, the enormous potentiality of the Internet will always be, where you can find many resources to learn about your diabetes and also to share experiences or feelings.In type 1 diabetes we have a lot of activity in social networks, but in type 2 diabetes (which is 90% of the total cases of diabetes) there is still a lot of ignorance and absence of involvement.There I would say that there is the big problem of diabetes today;in the involvement of people with type 2 diabetes.
P-.On the Internet, where and how to look for reliable information to help us know more about our pathology or the doubts we have?
A.- We have many prestigious institutional portals and also personal pages such as mine (www.jediazucarado.com) in which to find reliable content.But there is also the danger of finding dangerous misinformation.That is why I always say that common sense must be applied.Starting by looking for information in portals of scientific societies related to diabetes, hospitals, or pharmacists with websites dedicated to informing is a good starting point to discover later in chain more and more recommended sites.In type 2 diabetes there are very interesting projects to empower patients such as #connecting 2 on Instagram.An original Abbott initiative in which he participated and helping to become influencers to people with type 2 diabetes.
P-.I have heard him say that there are no gurus and that having followers does not imply that the truth is being told, what can aim about this?
R-.We live in a time when it seems that what is said by someone famous or influencer is the word of law.But an influencer is a person like any other, who can know about certain things ... or perhaps not knowing about anything especially, as there are many examples.However, they talk about almost everything.And when talking to your readers you end up losing the north a little because you have no confrontation of opinions.No one replicates anything or can correct you in your posts talking from your pulpit.In a fashion or technology blogger or influencer that has no relevance.But in health saying certain things can be very dangerous.
And there are many people who throw themselves to talk about things that are neither experts or professionals.Each one must be clear about our role in the network and how far we should go.I am a diabetes disseminator and I am a publicist, but I am neither endocrine or biochemical nor dietitian ... and I think many are not clear about this.And they can do a lot of harm to those who follow them.When you read the content of people who are not health professionals, take their messages into consideration, but do not necessarily follow them to the letter.I suggest again to apply common sense.
P-.There is another part that we must address such as technological advancement, alliances between pharmaceuticals and companies to improve the quality of life of patients, how do you see current changes?
R-.For years, in a matter of diabetes, hope is deposited in technological innovation.While science continues to advance in their studies toTo tackle and solve the origin of the disease, technology has run a lot and has allowed usQualitative jump in diabetes control ... and as life, something that patients even put above the control of the disease.
All the technological developments that we are living are very exciting and draw a very promising future with a diabetes under control.But for them to arrive, we need our health system to admit them in the catalog of financed benefits.You have to continue working and pressing so that the system includes those innovations.Because investing today in diabetes in these technologies means a future without complications and a much lower sanitary expense.Sometimes that distant horizon is lost a bit in the calculations of the health system, in which those who send are politicians who look very short term, four in four years.
P-.Improving automation (insulin and/or sensorThis important work and struggle to improve everything that gives this pathology?
R-.We have advanced a lot and today we have intelligent "moderately" systems that take away from a lot of task on a day -to -day basis.But we have a small ballast.On the one hand, the normative difficulty in this field, which makes progress very slow by all regulatory demands, and on the other the excessive precaution of pharmaceutical companies creating these technologies, which in their attempt to avoid possible problems derived fromA malfunction of its devices excessively limits the capacities of that technology, making the evolution slower.Today we have systems with algorithms that work alone in an insulin pump.But let's say they are excessively cautious and fearful, forcing excessive intervention of the patient in that device when it would not be necessary.The fear of the industry to possible reputation problems in its devices and a regulation that also does not allow the collaboration of the patient in the development of these systems makes everything slower.We must press together to evolve faster.
P-.In the voice of the patients, it is a very influential person, therefore, what should be improved or changed immediately, since you prove all kinds of new products to carry good control of the disease, including aspects of the system itselfsanitary?
R-.I think that, delving into the previous question, I would demand that our regulator that update certain regulations that separate us exaggerated from the industry.Today unlike other sectors, for a user such as me it is impossible to collaborate and help the manufacturer in the development and improvement of their devices.Although we should be in our right to know before a technology is prescribed, in Spain we cannot inform ourselves directly from the manufacturer about the products that we are going to receive in our endocrine consultation.And yet I can go to the Internet and see everything in twenty seconds.Every time I travel to European congresses and I talk about the issue with other people I see that in Spain we are exaggeratedly precautionary in these matters.And that lists us absurdly.In the same way that we have incorporated by law, for example, patients in diabetes advice in the health system or in clinical research committees ... Why can't we contribute in something as important as developmenttechnological?Or at least contribute and work together so that this development is more effective and accurate.
We must adapt to the times.Diabetes technology changes and evolves fast, but laws are for something old and motionless.Changing them costs too much sometimes.
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