Open house to focus on diabetes awareness

Mark the date right now. That means put down the newspaper and walk directly to your calendar and write: Diabetes Open House, on Monday, Nov. 5 from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Brown House. You know, it’s the brown house next the Healing Garden and just north of Bonner General Hospital.

Whether you suffer from diabetes or care about someone who does, this informative fair is free and open to everyone in the community who wants to know more.

More about new and improved insulin pumps, more about new and improved meters, more about new and improved shoes, more about counting carbs, more about insurance and basically more about improving your health and managing your symptoms.

Oh, and did we say it’s free? And, there’ll be free samples, everyone’s fave. And snacks. Yup, healthy and tasty snacks.

Oh, and the best part? Free 10-minute foot massages by a licensed massage therapist. That’s worth the effort to write the date on your daytimer, for sure.

We sat down with Audrey Buck and Leah Erban, certified diabetes educators at Bonner General Hospital and the event organizers. They said that they’ve gathered an extraordinary group of professionals and vendors to educate and provide resources to the community.

“Everyone should come,” Buck said. “Everyone who has diabetes or is at risk. Anyone who is interested including health professionals who want to learn about all the new technology.”

“We like to think we know all the people in the community with diabetes, but we don’t,” Erban said. “We’ll be there to talk to people and to help answer their questions.”

Buck said that for some people the news that they have diabetes is a shock and hard to come to grips with. She told of a 39-year-old patient who did yoga, bicycled everywhere and even taught ballet but just didn’t want to believe he had the disease.

But the astonishing reality is that almost 26 million people, that’s over eight percent of the population, in the U.S. has diabetes and seven million people have the disease but are undiagnosed. Accord-ing to the CDC in 2010, 215,000 people younger than 20 years old were known to have type 1 or type 2 diabetes. That number, as we all keep hearing, is rising exponentially each year.

Also in 2010, about eleven percent of U.S. residents aged 65 years and older had diabetes with close to 2 million people over age 20 being diagnosed in that year alone. So, we can’t say it doesn’t affect everyone.

The other reality is that diabetes is the leading cause of kidney failure, non-traumatic lower limb amputations and new cases of blindness in adults.

It’s the leading cause of heart disease, stroke and the seventh leading cause of death in the United States.

Who are these people who are at risk?

Buck and Erban said that anyone who has a family history of the disease is a candidate.

People who are overweight and carry their weight around their mid-section (35 inches for women and 40 inches for men) are in jeopardy. Anyone who was or has had a baby over nine pounds, or those who have low good cholesterol and high triglycerides are at risk.

“Excessive thirst and frequent urination are common symptoms,” Buck said. “Burning or tingling feet, dry skin, blurry vision happens too.”

“The biggest symptom that’s often not discussed is a lack of energy,” Erban added. She said that some people don’t think to put fatigue and diabetes together.

If you have any questions about whether or not you or someone you know may a candidate for diabetes, come to the Diabetes Day Open House and they’ll be answered.

Kathy Hubbard is a trustee on Bonner General Hospital Foundation Board. She can be reached at kathyleehubbard@yahoo.com, 264-4029.