Patients With Diabetes Catch a Break

From the annual meeting of the Eastern Vascular Society in Philadelphia:
 It’s not easy for people with diabetes. Among their problems is that just about any other medical condition is worse when it happens against the backdrop of diabetes.
So a report on Sept. 24 that endovascular repair of an abdominal aortic aneurysm (EVAR) in patients with diabetes is no [...]

Rheumatoid Arthritis: Killer Disease

from the European Congress of Rheumatology, EULAR, in Copenhagen
Medical history was made yesterday with official declaration of a new cardiovascular risk factor: rheumatoid arthritis, along with two other rheumatologic disorders, ankylosing spondylitis and psoriatic arthritis.
“In our view, rheumatoid arthritis [RA], ankylosing spondylitis [AS], and psoriatic arthritis [PsA] should be seen as new cardiovascular risk factors,” said [...]

Tweeting a Medical Meeting

The American Diabetes Association’s annual Scientific Sessions in New Orleans was the 5th medical meeting that I’ve “tweeted.” For those who don’t know about Twitter, here’s info from the Association of Health Care Journalists on what it is and how health journalists can use it: http://tinyurl.com/mdz7w6.
My approach to “meeting tweeting” has evolved over the last [...]

All Over the Internet, But Not in Your Journal

 At the annual meeting of the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists, Dr. Saleh A. Aldasouqi presented the case of patient with type 1 diabetes who had decided to get a permanent tattoo on his wrist that identified him as a diabetic. The patient, who had lived with diabetes for 35 of his 36 years, had [...]

Professional Objectivity

As a medical reporter who has been writing about diabetes for more than 20 years and living with the disease myself since 1973, covering JAMA’s diabetes “theme issue” press briefing on Tuesday was familiar territory.
Four papers were presented. Frans J. Th. Wackers, M.D., Ph.D., of Yale University reported that routine screening for cardiovascular disease in [...]

A Taste of Reality for Drug Trials?

At the April 1st hearing of the FDA’s Endocrinologic and Metabolic Drugs Advisory Committee, the panel was asked to evaluate Bristol-Myers Squibb’s cardiovascular safety data for its candidate diabetes drug saxagliptin. This was the first diabetes drug to be reviewed by the committee since the FDA issued new guidance in December 2008 requiring companies to [...]

Glycemic targets: How low to go?

From the 2009 UCSF Diabetes Update and Advances in Endocrinology and Metabolism meeting.
Some recent reports from major trials and long-term follow-up of large diabetes treatment studies have sparked a lot of discussion about how low to try and push hemoglobin A1c levels in people with diabetes. Clinicians may be wondering whether intensive glucose control is safe [...]

Signs of Change?

From the Avalere Health Diabetes Forum, Washington, D.C.:
Lots of folks here in the capital are chattering about health care reform and those speaking at this meeting are no exception.
Not surprisingly, several speakers said that the odds of achieving major reform appeared better this year than they did in 1993 during the Clinton administration, the last [...]

Stemming the Diabetes Tide

from the American Diabetes Association’s annual advanced post-graduate course, New York
It’s pretty routine for a medical-meeting speaker–especially when starting the leisurely and lengthy type of lecture they gave at this meeting–to begin  by placing the disease in question in some sort of introductory context. The demographics of type 2 diabetes, mentioned several times during 2 days of talks here, are [...]