Since 2010, the official estimate of people in the United States who have diabetes has climbed from 26 million to 29 million, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Not surprisingly, the estimated number of adults who have prediabetes also has increased: from 79 million to 86 million. That’s more than one-third of the U.S. adult population. Meanwhile, only one in nine of these people know they are at risk of developing type 2 diabetes.
According to the CDC, 15-30 percent of people with prediabetes will develop type 2 diabetes within five years without adequate weight loss and moderate physical activity.
“These new numbers are alarming and underscore the need for an increased focus on reducing the burden of diabetes in our country,” Director of the CDC’s Division of Diabetes Translation Ann Albright, PhD, said in a news release. “Diabetes is costly in both human and economic terms. It’s urgent that we take swift action to effectively treat and prevent this serious disease.”
The AMA is creating innovative clinical-community linkages that leverage the existing, substantial body of evidence on diabetes prevention in order to make best practices easier to implement.
The AMA is taking on this troubling disease through its Improving Health Outcomes initiative, which is working to prevent the development of diabetes and its associated health complications among adults who have prediabetes.
The AMA has partnered with the YMCA of the USA, in support of the CDC’s National Diabetes Prevention Program, to achieve three key objectives:
- Increase education and awareness of prediabetes by promoting screening of those at risk
- Increase physician referrals of people with prediabetes to the YMCA’s evidence-based Diabetes Prevention Program
- Create feedback loops that link the patient’s progress in the program to the physician’s practice so that information can be integrated into the patient’s care plan
Pilots are underway in Delaware, Indianapolis and Minnesota’s Twin Cities, where clinical practices are helping the AMA develop models to address these objectives. Once the pilot work is completed later this year, the AMA will spread these models to other practices and communities. Learn more about how this prevention program is helping patients avoid diabetes.
