ABU DHABI // Researchers in Al Ain are developing tailor-made techniques to educate people in the UAE about the health risks of diabetes and how to prevent it. Tawam Hospital has teamed up with Johns Hopkins International in a pilot project geared specifically towards the UAE, where one in five people suffers from the disease. "What is useful to educate the public in Baltimore, New York or Chicago is not necessarily the same as what you need in Abu Dhabi," said Dr Riad Abdelkarim, deputy medical director of Tawam Hospital.
"We need to get an idea of what people are willing to do, what resources they have, what would catch their attention and what would keep their attention." This was a particularly difficult task because of the make-up of the community that Tawam Hospital served: "In a population that is as diverse and multicultural as the one that we have here in the UAE you have to survey that population and get an idea which strategy to invest your resources in," said Dr Bachar Afandi, head of the endocrinology division at Tawam.
"The prevalence of diabetes here is amazingly high, higher than we had expected. Many of these people, up to half of them, do not know that they have diabetes. This creates a problem because they already have a lot of complications at the time of diagnosis." Complications can include premature coronary artery disease, kidney disease and failure, blindness and even chronic pain in the feet and hands.
"What we try to do is to educate the public about diabetes and about predisposing factors, defining the symptoms for diabetes and encouraging them to get tested for diabetes," said Dr Abdelkarim. Diabetes is a condition in which education can play a particularly important role. People who are pre-diabetic can avoid the disease altogether if they make the appropriate changes to their lifestyle and those who have diabetes can reduce the complications if it is caught sufficiently early.
"It is very important to educate the public and educate diabetics before they know they're diabetics," said Dr Afandi. "We need to educate the public about the prevalence, because it is really common." One problem is the misinformation that surrounds the disease. "If you are able to develop and present to the community in Al Ain, Abu Dhabi and the Emirates a comprehensive health education and awareness programme you end up bringing about a more sophisticated public," said Dr Abdelkarim.
"You can break down these knowledge barriers and get rid of some of the myths. You're able to encourage people to come in and get tested." @Email:amcmeans@thenational.ae