Diabetic Neuropathy

Introduction

Diabetic neuropathy is a type of nerve damage that can occur if you have diabetes. High blood sugar can injure nerve fibres throughout your body, but diabetic neuropathy most often damages nerves in your legs and feet. Diabetic neuropathy is a common serious complication of diabetes. Yet you can often prevent diabetic neuropathy or slow its progress with tight blood sugar control and a healthy lifestyle.

Treatment

Good control of diabetes over time is the key to treating diabetic neuropathy. There is no cure for neuropathy, but keeping your blood sugar within a target range can reduce symptoms and prevent them from getting worse.To help control your diabetes, eat food that is good for you and exercise. Controlling diabetes means maintaining blood sugar levels (A1c) within the target range. This will do more than anything else to help prevent diabetic neuropathy from getting worse.

Statistics

The statistics in Singapore are no less mind-boggling. The prevalence of diabetes is 9% in Singapore residents between the age of 18 and 69 years. This figure is much higher (32.4%) in the 60 to 69 years age group. With such statistics, it is not surprising that diabetic retinopathy is an important health problem in Singapore.

Research

Over 13,000 screenings were done in the first two years of the programme. Currently over 1,000 screenings are done monthly in the two polyclinic clusters. Well over 150,000 screenings would have been done to date by the polyclinics, hospital diabetes centre, optometrists, general practice clinics, Diabetic Society of Singapore and the National Kidney Foundation combined. By all accounts, this would still qualify as the largest on-going screening programme for diabetic retinopathy worldwide