5 Pieces of Good News for People With Diabetes
It's Friday and you need some good news and since some good things are happening for people with diabetes we wanted to share and we started from the bottom now we here.
1. The U.S. Congress once again approved funding for continued diabetes research. The Special Diabetes Program (SDP) was renewed for another year, which secures $150 million for diabetes research initiatives like the Artificial Pancreas and retinopathy treatments.
2. People who live with diabetes are experiencing less and less complications. "Diabetes, which affects millions of Americans, finding that rates of heart attacks, strokes, kidney failure and amputations fell sharply over the past two decades."
3. Alabama passed a bill that authorizes trained school personnel to administer insulin and glucagon to students with diabetes when a nurse is not present. This is a huge win that helps keep kids with diabetes safe at school.
4. There is a woman in New Zealand who has been living with type 1 diabetes for 78 years, which makes her the "world's longest survivor of type 1 diabetes". "She was told she would never have kids. But she's had four, including twins. And now she has eight grandchildren, seven great-grandchildren, and another one on the way." Awww.
5. The FDA is actually listening to and engaging with us, the diabetes community. "On March 31, 2014 a discussion was held [with the diabetes online community] on the FDA’s new proposed guidelines and what standards blood glucose meters should have to meet before the FDA clears them for sale."
Let's make sure they keep hearing from us - read about how to comment to the FDA about glucose meter test strip accuracy here before May 7th.