Better Late Than Never!!

Whilst I welcome this article.

It rather infuriates me as since Claudia was diagnosed on May 1st 2008 I have been asking for a National Type 1 Awareness Campaign. I have said on many occasions if there had been a poster "similar to the Meningitis Poster" I would have know and been able to tell be Doctor straight "I want you to check for Type 1" as she had all the classic symptoms, (which I actually told him)

Instead I was sat looking at the Meningitis poster saying it is not meningitis. The up shot was our GP implied we were neurotic and Claudia had a sore throat. Several hours later Claudia was in hospital in the High Dependency Unit! We were lucky she pulled through.

My point is if people listened to me and other parents this campaign could have started years ago!!

Diabetes Power's campaign will start to be rolled out in March, please help support Diabetes Power.

I believe as parents of Children with Type 1 & Adults with Type 1 we have the power and passion to make this campaign successful. It will only cost a few hours of our time ensuring posters are put up in schools, hospitals, GP'S surgeries, super markets, play groups and anywhere else people think the message should be delivered.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/8330902/Type-I-diabetes-missed-in-thousands-of-children.html

The Telegraph's Article

Type I diabetes 'missed in thousands of children'
Thousands of children with Type I diabetes are not being diagnosed until they have suffered from a life-threatening 'warning sign', doctors say today (FRI).
By Stephen Adams, Medical Correspondent 6:30AM GMT 18 Feb 2011
1 Comment
A quarter of the 29,000 children with Type I diabetes in Britain are only diagnosed because they have an attack of Diabetic Ketoacidosis, or DKA, according to Dr Julie Edge, a consultant paediatric diabetologist at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford.

DKA, which usually only occurs when Type I diabetes is fully established, is an illness caused by dangerously high blood glucose levels. It can cause nausea, vomiting, stomach pain and rapid breathing, and potentially lead to a coma.

Of children diagnosed with Type I diabetes before the age of five, 35 per cent have had DKA, said Dr Edge.

Her report on the problem of late diagnosis will be published in the British Medical Journal tomorrow (SAT).

Sarah Johnson, of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, a charity, said: "It’s very concerning that children are at risk because Type I diabetes, which is five times more common than meningitis, is not being recognised.

"We are encouraging parents and health professionals to look out for the signs of extreme thirst, tiredness, weight loss, frequent urination, including recent-onset bed-wetting and blurred vision in children as an indication of Type I diabetes."

Dr Tabitha Randell, a consultant paediatric endocrinologist at diabetologist at Nottingham University Hospital, said it was vital that parents acted on those potential signals.

Wetting the bed again or urinating frequently was not always just a sign of stress, she said.

"It's important to take them along to the doctor and ask them to check their blood sugar level," she said. "A single finger prick will tell you there and then if they have got diabetes."

She added that almost no children were born with Type I diabetes, but most cases emerged at around five or six and 10 or 11.

Simon O’Neill, of Diabetes UK, another charity, said: "With around 2,000 children diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes every year, it’s worrying that a quarter of children will have only been diagnosed through DKA."