Effective Leadership In Addressing Diabetes As A Public Health Issue

Overview of Diabetes

Discuss about the Expanding and Sustaining Integrated Health Care.

Diabetes is a complex class of disease caused by a variety of reasons. Individuals suffering from diabetes are characterized by a high blood sugar caused by low insulin or in the body cells do not utilize the available insulin. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), over 250 million people suffer from diabetes globally. The disease is estimated to be among the top fifty causes of death by 2025 worldwide. Three common of diabetes are common. They include type 1 and type 2 diabetes and gestational diabetes. Diabetes poses a major challenge in the health sector, these calls for effective leadership on public health issues in order to help curb the disease. In this case, the essay will discuss the effective leadership and the leadership strategies that can be used to address diabetes as a public health issue.

Diabetes is a medical condition whereby the human body does not process food as required for functions such as energy. In normal body processes, the food that we consume is converted into sugar or glucose so that the body can use it for energy. With the help of the insulin produced by the pancreas, the glucose is absorbed into the body cells. When a person is suffering from diabetes, their body does not either produce enough insulin or is not capable of using its own insulin as it is required. As a result, sugar levels increase in the blood system thus the rise of the common term “sugar” that is used to refer to diabetes. The disease can trigger certain health problems such as heart disease, kidney failure, amputations, neuropathy and even blindness. There are various types of diabetes such as type 1 diabetes, type 2 diabetes and gestational diabetes (American Diabetes Association, 2014).

Diabetes has become a worldwide epidemic and it has the potential to cause a global healthcare crisis. It has been established that the disease is currently affecting about 371 million people all over the world and it is growing more aggressively than anticipated. In Australia for instance, a report released in 2013 said that approximately 1.5 million people were suffering from diabetes among whom half of them were not aware that they were diabetic. The annual healthcare bill that rises from diabetes and its associated health complications is approximate $ 14.6 billion, a figure that is rapidly sky-rocketing (Amos, McCarty & Zimmet, 2012). Leaders all over the world are putting effort into advocating for measures that will help control the catastrophic epidemic and eliminate the huge diabetes death toll. These efforts are however being deterred by a couple of problems.

To begin with, leaders are faced with the challenge of some of the diabetic patients’ failure to adhere to the self-care medication process prescribed to them by the clinicians such as insulin injections and keeping their blood glucose levels in check using self-monitoring devices (Basu, Yoffe, Hills &Lustig, 2013). This could be attributed to factors such as pain, which could be physical and psychological, expensive medication costs, patients’ unstable emotional state and their assumptions of the side effects and the intrusions and inconveniences that the medications are likely to cause in their daily lives. Some patients use reasons for non-adherence such as being too occupied or being publicly embarrassed to use the insulin. For instance, school-going children with type 1 diabetes could feel stigmatized by other students for taking insulin injections in the afternoon and this could make them skip such doses. Patients also find it as an economic burden because adhering to the medical advice is a financial constraint (Brugha, &Zwi, 2013). Therefore, nurses and doctors should educate their patients on the importance of adhering to medication in order to minimize death.

Leadership Issues and Challenges

The other challenge lies with the healthcare providers who also lack the required adherence in administering and recommending the required glycemic control to patients. For instance, in India, insulin is not introduced to diabetic patients during the early stages of diabetes and this is evidence enough that lack of timely intervention worsens the glycemic control. (Zimmet, Magliano, Herman & Shaw 2014). Leaders are constantly advocating for timely administration and initiation of proper therapies that help in facilitating glycemic control and delay the kicking in of the diabetic related complications and eventually improve the patient’s quality of life. These efforts are however being challenged by the physician’s lack of adherence to proper medical administration (Chan, DeMelo, Gingras&Gucciardi, 2015). In this case, healthcare providers should undergo some form of training where they are taught on the mechanisms of controlling the disease at an early stage.

Further, there is limited awareness about diabetes and its complications. A significant portion of the general public lacks the knowledge that the disease is caused by the current lifestyles risk factors, particularly the poor and unhealthy diet, obesity and lack of physical exercise. The majority of the diabetic patients do not know that appropriate glycemic control helps to minimize the risk of suffering from the health complications associated with diabetes. Leaders find it challenging to keep the epidemic under control while most people are ignorant about the disease (Chin, Goddu, Ferguson & Peek, 2014). Therefore, public awareness on diabetes should be instituted so that it can be detected and controlled at an early stage.

In addition, the leaders are faced with the challenge of lack of coordination in the primary prevention against diabetes efforts. People are not ready to modify their lifestyles in a manner that will help them avoid the diabetes risk factors. Sticking to a healthy diet and avoiding fast foods that have high levels of calories seems to be a major challenge to people. Also, most individuals find it challenging to adhere to a physical activity routine with the discipline and commitment it requires (Jack, 2016).

In the general public healthcare system, various issues are encountered by leaders as they strive in their advocacy for better healthcare. First, there is limited funding for the leaders to carry out effective leadership strategies and advocate for better health measures. They lack the necessary finances to solve community health challenges, to educate and empower the people on matters concerning health issues, to enforce policies and regulations that protect the people’s health and ensure medical safety and to mobilize the diverse partnerships in identifying and solving health problems. All these responsibilities require funding which is not sufficient for leaders (Gallagher & LeRoith, 2015).

Also, there is limited research and development being carried out on the effective methods of interventions in addressing public health issues. It is pertinent that thorough research is carried out so as to develop new insights and formulate innovative solutions to the prevalent health problems. This is not the case however since there are insufficient epidemiology studies being done to address these issues. The leaders find it difficult to carry out their roles in advocating for appropriate measures to tackle various public health issues while they are not well-equipped with information that could be of great help to the public (Rowitz, 2013). 

Leadership Issues in Public Health

Furthermore, leaders are faced with the challenges of lack of preparedness in the event of a potential public health crisis. Health disasters catch them unawares with several surprise and uncertainty factors. Sometimes, a leader can be incapacitated by grief or fear and this would greatly impair the leaders executive and advocacy functions. A public health leader could have their ability to lead compromised during the response to a health crisis. People in positions of leadership should strengthen their emotional intelligence so as to cope with health disasters (Herman, 2014). In this case, it is important for leaders to be at an alert for public health crisis so as to help curb the disease at early stages.

Another challenge is the organizational problems in the case of a health crisis. The overall organization response to a public health disaster depends on the leaders’ ability to effectively operate and mobilize the organization. An organization poses various challenges to a public healthcare leader in that it requires simultaneous coordination of its many elements such as the emergency services, the hospitals, and the first respondents care providers. Another problem is that a leader has to organize their strategies in a manner that integrates a response to the public health crisis (Kalra, 2016).

In addressing these challenges, it is important to engage the community in the action on public health care issues. Leaders should come up with community based forums that respond to the challenges in health by developing a positive attitude in addressing public health issues like diabetes. in addition, leaders should come up with diabetic based groups that will help individuals make critical decisions regarding their health. Therefore, through the support of leaders, diabetics will be able to achieve a healthy lifestyle which is the first step to better future.

As an individual, I would use leadership and advocacy strategies to address the issue of diabetes prevalence. The social media would be an effective platform to reach out to a greater audience. First and foremost, I would advocate for constant monitoring of a person’s health which will enhance early detection in case of silent or undiagnosed diabetes. I would encourage the people to participate in risk assessment tests and constant screening that would detect the onset of diabetes. In the case of an early detection, I would highly advise the diagnosed persons to take the necessary medical precautionary measures to delay the kicking in of the diabetic related complications or prevent them all together. This referral to clinical assessment would help in improving the quality of life of the people with diabetes since there would be effective management of the disease that would, in turn, reduce the risk of possible complications and mortality. If any complications arise, their progress can be monitored and slowed down upon consulting a medical practitioner (Schwarz & Riemenschneider, 2016).

Moreover, I would advocate on behalf of the stigmatized diabetic patients that people would refrain from discriminating against them and creating a social stigma around diabetes. This would help put an end to the secretive culture of diabetes that creates a barrier to proper self-care medication in public and accessing medical assistance. It would also boost the diabetic patients’ self-confidence in participating in society’s activities and going about their work-related activities (Liu et al. 2017)

In addition, I would advocate for lifestyle behavior change because the current lifestyle is a risk factor for diabetes. Changing of diet and sticking to a nutritious healthy diet plan, engaging in frequent physical activities so as to reduce weight and avoid obesity would greatly help in reducing the risk of suffering from diabetes. I would assess and identify the individuals that are at the greatest risk of suffering from diabetes using non-clinical assessment tests and refer them to lifestyle behavior change programs and to a clinical setting to assess whether they are at a risk of getting diabetes (Schabert, Browne, Mosely & Speight, 2013).

In my leadership and advocating strategies, I would probably encounter certain challenges. For instance, medical facilities are not accessible to a significant proportion of people who are at a high risk of suffering from diabetes. This could be due to financial constraints. As a result, these people cannot monitor their health to make early detections of diabetes and take the appropriate measures to reduce the risk of developing diabetic related complications. The patients diagnosed with diabetes can neither access medical care nor be in a position to conduct self-care medication to treat the disease (Wright, Rowitz, Merkle, Reid, Robinson, Herzog & Baker, 2012). To solve this, I would advocate the government to ensure that the diabetes screening and detection programs are made affordable and accessible to everybody. In addition, I would request the government to establish innovative strategies of funding the diabetes prevention and treatment program by ensuring that the personal and employees compensation insurance schemes are regarded as co-funding sources (Kaldor, Magnusson & Colagiuri, 2015).

While calling for lifestyle behavior changes, there are some possible barriers that I would encounter. The vigorous marketing and promotion strategies for unhealthy foods would pose a challenge to my efforts. To solve this challenge, I would campaign for proper food labeling disclosing all the contents and health hazards of any food by the marketers and this would empower the people in making healthier choices as they purchase their food. Pertaining to physical activity, the advancing technology pauses a challenge in that it makes transport easier and people do not get to exercise while walking. For instance, uber services and electric trains discourage people from walking or cycling over very short distances. To solve this, I would make an appeal to the workplace managers to discourage sedentary employees who cannot walk up a flight of stairs but have to wait for an elevator or take an escalator. I would request them to modify their workplace designs or deter the regular use of elevators and escalators so that employees can get to exercise as they take the stairs and consequently reduce the risk of diabetes (Guariguata et al. 2014).

Conclusion

The incidences of diabetes are increasing in both developed and developing countries due to the prevalence of obesity which is brought about by consumption of an unhealthy diet and physical inactivity. Leaders have continuously and tirelessly advocated for prevention measures against the global epidemic and although their efforts have been deterred by various challenges and barriers there is a need for everybody to engage in wise lifestyle behavior. There is also the need to avoid stigmatizing diabetic patients who should, in turn, adhere to their self-care medication as prescribed to them by the physicians. This will help in the glycemic control which delays the onset of health complications or reduces their progress where they have already developed. Each and every person should strive in improving their quality of life whether they are already suffering from diabetes or not.

References

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Schwarz, P. E., &Riemenschneider, H. (2016). Slowing Down the Progression of Type 2 Diabetes: We Need Fair, Innovative, and Disruptive Action on Environmental and Policy Levels! Diabetes Care, 39(Supplement 2), S121-S126.

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