Minister of Health David Caplan has announced a plan to better manage diabetes. Part of the $741-million program includes insulin pumps for 1,300 Ontarians with Type-1 diabetes.
Ontario to supply type-1 diabetics with insulin pumps
July 22, 2008
Health Reporter
The Ontario government today announced the launch of a new $741 million strategy in an effort to curb soaring rates of diabetes in the province.
The comprehensive plan will help those living with both forms of the disease – types 1 and 2 – and includes prevention and education strategies to make sure people don’t get diabetes in the first place.
One of the plan’s key components will ensure that more than 1,300 adults with type 1 diabetes will have access to free insulin pumps and supplies.
Diabetes rates are mounting in Ontario and roughly 900,000 people are currently living with the disease.
“That number is expected to rise steadily in two years to an estimated 1.2 million Ontarians who will be living with diabetes,” Health Minister David Caplan told a news conference today at the Flemingdon Health Centre in Toronto. “That’s why it’s important to act now.”
The government has pledged to expand funding to treatment programs, especially ones that provide team-based care, and to create an online registry for patients to help them better manage their diabetes.
Caplan called the electronic diabetes registry, which will roll out in Spring 2009, an important tool to help people living with diabetes manage their disease in partnership with their healthcare team.
“The end result will be faster diagnosis and faster treatment for Ontarians living with diabetes,” he said. I believe it will dramatically change health care in Ontario and help reduce the incidence of diabetes in the province.”
The registry is the first step in Ontario’s e-Health Strategy that will provide all Ontario residents with an electronic health record by 2015, he said.
The diabetes strategy was based on internationally accepted best practices and the recommendations of the Diabetes Management Expert Panel.
Other elements of the strategy include:
– Education campaigns to raise awareness of the risk factors of type 2 diabetes, such as obesity, high blood pressure and high cholesterol levels. The campaigns will be targeted to populations at high risk of developing type 2 diabetes, including the aboriginal community, Hispanics, South Asians and African Canadians, as well as those in low-income groups.
– A $75 million investment to improve access to bariatric surgery - a procedure to treat obesity, one of the risk factors for type 2 diabetes.
– Expanding services for people with chronic kidney disease, a complication of diabetes that affects roughly 40 per cent of Ontarians living with diabetes. This will include increasing dialysis service capacity at regional centres, dialysis satellites, long-term care homes and independent health facilities.