The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is creating a nationwide mission this week with National Public Health Week, an event that all travel nursing professionals should keep in mind as they care for various patients. NPHW contains themes that will strive toward making the U.S. a more healthy country as a whole. Although reducing smoking rates and increasing immunization coverage were mentioned among the NPHW guidelines, diabetes was also a key concern for the CDC, and it’s easy to see why.
Facts about diabetes in the U.S.
Diabetes is one of the most challenging public health issues of our time. Based on the CDC’s 2014 National Diabetes Statistics Report:
- 29.1 million Americans (about 9.3 percent of the population) have diabetes.
- Even more startling, 8.1 percent of these individuals are undiagnosed, which means that one out of four people in this demographic are not taking the preventative steps they need to get the condition under control, such as a proper diet.
- 86 million Americans (more than one in three adults) are prediabetic.
- Mortality rates are 50 percent higher for diabetics than non-diabetics.
- Diabetes costs an astonishing $245 billion for treatment and lost wages, and medical costs are twice as high for diabetics compared to non-diabetics.
- If weight loss and moderate physical activity aren’t achieved on a wide scale, 15 to 30 percent of prediabetics will develop Type 2 diabetes within the next five years.
- There are many serious complications associated with diabetes, including heart disease; stroke; loss of toes, feet or legs; kidney failure and blindness.
Although these trends can seem alarming for RNs as well as the general public, the good news is Type 2 diabetes is a disease that can be managed with a proper diet.
Eating well is crucial for prediabetics and diabetics
Monitoring blood sugar is crucial for people with diabetes. What they eat, how much they eat and even when they eat can drastically alter medical nutrition therapy, according to the Mayo Clinic. Overall, diabetics need to stick to a plan that includes a lot of fruits, vegetables and whole grains in order to keep their metabolic rates steady. Moderation and sticking to mealtime schedules can also help.
Based on a recent study highlighted in HealthDay, the timing of meals could have a direct impact on the development of diabetes. Type 2 diabetics involved in the study who ate a larger morning meal and smaller lunches and dinners moderated their insulin levels and control blood sugar more effectively than Type 2 diabetics who ate smaller breakfasts and larger lunches and dinners. As a travel nurse, this means it is a good idea to encourage your patients not to skip “the most important meal of the day.”
According to the American Diabetes Association, understanding carbs and how they affect glycemic index is also very important, so travel nurses should also have a lengthy discussion with prediabetic and diabetic patients about the three main types of carbs, sugar alcohols, desserts, low-calorie sweeteners and how all of these fit into medical nutrition therapy.