Diabetes Self-Care

Diabetes is unusual in that your input can directly influence your future health. Your doctor will prescribe treatment for your diabetes and other members of the healthcare team will advise you on many aspects of managing the disease. But it is your self-care that will ultimately make the difference.

Diabetes self-care involves fitting the prescribed treatment plan into your daily life, monitoring your blood glucose levels on a regular basis, and making minor adjustments where necessary in order to achieve good control.

In a nutshell, your role is to make your treatment plan work for YOU. You can do this by following the treatment plan, monitoring your blood glucose levels and communicating with your healthcare team.

Your Diabetes Self-Care Checklist

• Take your medications as prescribed - safely, regularly and at specific times.
• Adopt a health lifestyle.
• Consider food choices.
• Pay attention to your level of physical activity.
• Commit to regular self-monitoring of your blood glucose.
• Use the results of your blood glucose tests to make adjustments to your treatment plan under the guidance of your healthcare team.
• Learn more about YOUR diabetes and how it affects YOU.

In addition, there are a number of their healthcare practices that you should adopt, including the following:

• Develop good foot care.
• Follow your sick day plan (if you do not have one ask you healthcare team to help you).
• Try to avoid very high or very low blood glucose levels.
• Know when and how to contact your healthcare team.
• Develop coping skills for dealing with stress, depression, and other emotional problems associated with chronic illness.

It may be unrealistic to think that you can make all of these changes at one time. Try to select both long-term (e.g. to lose 30 lbs) and shor-term goals (walk 15 minutes each night).

Knowledge is Important

The more knowledge you acquire about diabetes, and what works best for your individual circumstances, the more power you will have to achieve good control.

Although diabetes can not be cured at present, it can be controlled but the person with diabetes needs to be constantly alert and aware of what affects them and their diabetes.

You must learn to take control of your diabetes on a day-to-day basis. This will be easier the more you learn about your diabetes.

Fully Utilize Your Healthcare Team

The role of your healthcare team is to provide information and strategies to help you improve your diabetes. Keep in regular contact with your healthcare team about any questions or concerns your may have.

Have your questions prepared beforehand and repeat them if the answer is unclear to you.

It is also important to keep in close contact with your healthcare team so that they can monitor your long-term progress. They should also be consulted too if you wish to make major changes to your lifestyle (e.g. diet or exercise pattern).

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