Australia’s diabetes crisis failure hurting remote communities most

Australia is failing to confront the escalating diabetes issue, with new figures revealing how the nation’s most disadvantaged health districts have been hit hard | FULL LIST

A child’s blood glucose level is monitored. Diabetes Australia is calling for a national hospital diabetes audit to ascertain how many people are coming into the hospital system with diabetes-related complications. Picture: Marian Faa

Australia is failing to confront the extent of the escalating diabetes crisis, top doctors in the field say, with new figures revealing the massive extent of hospitalisations for kidney disease in the nation’s most disadvantaged health districts.

There are more than 10,000 episodes of hospitalisation for diabetes-related kidney disease in the Northern Territory every year, a rate four times above northern areas of Sydney. The rate of hospitalisation for kidney disease as a proportion of population is also very high in western Queensland, the Hunter, New England and Central Coast regions of NSW, central Queensland and the Sunshine Coast, and Northern Queensland.

The data, which is modelled on figures from the Australian Institute of Health and Wellbeing’s report Geographical variation in disease: diabetes, cardiovascular and chronic kidney disease, reveals that the 10 Primary Health Networks reporting the highest rates of diabetes-related kidney disease are all in regional and remote areas.

On the back of the figures, Diabetes Australia is calling for a national hospital diabetes audit to ascertain how many people are coming into the hospital system with diabetes-related complications. They also want a national screening check for kidney disease to be rolled out with a focus on remote Australia.

“Chronic kidney disease leads to increased mortality,” said Sof Andrikopoulos, Diabetes Australia spokesperson. “We need to be able to find and diagnose people early on, and then to practically manage those people with the tools that we have that can slow the progression of kidney disease.”

Diabetes Australia spokesperson rofessor Sof Andrikopoulos, who in 2015 oversaw a study in which people consumed Big Macs and different drinks to see what effect it had on their body. Picture: David Caird

The Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee on Friday announced its decision to recommend the drug finerenone be added to the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme for type 2 diabetes sufferers with advanced kidney disease but noted it had “a limited place in therapy given a small and uncertain reduction in clinical events in chronic kidney disease and cardiovascular disease with use in combination with standard of care”.

Diabetes Australia wants a greater focus on prevention and management of type 2 diabetes, warning Australia is in a state of “heightened crisis” as cases escalate.

A major report in the UK warned this month that the diabetes was at crisis levels as cases there hit five million.

Professor Andrikopoulos said the outlook in Australia was “absolutely” just as bad. There are 1.5 million people living with diabetes in Australia, with 1.3 million of those cases type 2 diabetes, which is heavily influenced by lifestyle factors. At least another estimated half a million have the disease but are undiagnosed. “If you look at the adult population, we’re in a very similar as a proportion of population to the UK,” he said.

Diabetes Australia said preventing or delaying chronic kidney disease – which necessitates ongoing dialysis or transplants – would save billions of dollars long-term for the health system.