BEIJING: During her work conducting community-based health screening, nursing practitioner Zhang Zhiping found that many people, including youngsters, would come to consult her on diabetes prevention and treatment.
“Most of the people wary of getting diabetes will describe their symptoms to us, and then get their blood sugar levels tested,” said Zhang.
Zhang serves at the Workers’ Hospital of Tengzhou in east China’s Shandong Province. Every year, this hospital carries out free physical examinations checking for chronic diseases in local communities, which include diabetes screening. Once detected, diabetes patients will receive follow-up visits every three months.
Against the backdrop of an aging population and a change in people’s lifestyles, the prevalence rate of diabetes continues to climb in China.
While 11.9 percent of Chinese adults are diagnosed with diabetes, 18.6 percent of them are prediabetic, according to data from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
This disease, with complications that are main causes of blindness, kidney failure, cardiovascular and cerebrovascular health events, as well as amputation in Chinese adults, is taking a heavy toll on people’s health.
Most Chinese diabetes patients are diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, and the prevalence rate has increased more than 10 times in the past 30 years. –Agencies
