|
|
Publications and Products
Interim Report:
Proposed Recommendations for Action
A National Public Health Initiative on Diabetes and Women's Health
Return to the Contents
Strategic Framework
Vision and Goals
The ultimate vision of the National Public Health Initiative on Diabetes
and Women’s Health is to:
- prevent diabetes among women whenever possible,
- promote early diagnosis and appropriate management of diabetes among
women across the life stages,
- prevent, delay, or minimize complications from diabetes among women,
and
- educate the families and communities of women at risk for diabetes,
and provide the support they need to prevent diabetes and its complications.
With this vision as a foundation, the Initiative’s specific goals
are to work within the framework of Healthy People 2010 to:
- garner the national attention of policy makers, public health professionals,
other advocates for women’s issues, researchers, and the general
public that diabetes is a prominent public health issue,
- develop consensus among key stakeholders that there is a need to develop
priority strategies, policies, and research to improve diabetes and
women’s health,
- delineate the public health role in diabetes and women’s health
at national, state, and community levels, and improve the capacity of
these public health sectors to fulfill that role,
- unite partners from multiple sectors of society in a coordinated strategy
to prevent and manage diabetes among women, and
- empower women to adopt prevention strategies that will improve their
overall health and will delay or prevent diabetes and its complications.
Guiding Principles
The guiding principles underlying the National Public Health Initiative
on Diabetes and Women’s Health are as follows:
- A public health approach to diabetes among women should be
adopted. This approach aims to improve the health and quality of life
for all women primarily through prevention and focuses on all factors
influencing health status: physical, behavioral, psychological, and
socioeconomic.
- Collaboration within and between multiple sectors of society
is essential for success. These sectors include public and private health
care organizations, business and industry, education and environment,
communication and media, and policy makers.
- Strategies and policies must fully consider and take into account
the unique needs of women in different life stages among all
racial, ethnic, religious, and cultural groups.
- Women and grassroots organizations should be fully engaged as active
partners in policy decisions and in program planning, implementation,
and evaluation. The strong involvement and support of men should be
sought as well.
- Leadership of state and community agencies and groups must share
accountability for adopting approaches to improve the health status
of women.
- Actions should be based on sound research from all relevant
scientific fields, and the pursuit of additional research should focus
on filling gaps in scientific knowledge. Assessment must guide policy
and program development.
- Measurable outcomes for programs and policies should be established
so that progress and impact can be evaluated and approaches can be modified
as needed.
- Strategies and policies must be sustainable and integrated
over time, not just one-time activities or interventions. New initiatives
should build on existing resources, services, and natural links between
local, state, and federal agencies and organizations in both the public
and private sectors.
Public Health Prevention Framework
Levels of Prevention
The recommendations in this report encompass three levels of prevention.
Primary prevention aims to prevent diabetes from occurring among
women. Secondary prevention aims to identify diabetes at its earliest
stage so that prompt and appropriate management can be initiated. Successful
secondary prevention reduces the negative impact of diabetes on a woman’s
life. The goal of tertiary prevention is to reduce or minimize
the consequences of diabetes once it has developed. That is, to eliminate,
or at least delay and reduce, the onset and severity of complications
and disability due to diabetes.
Life Stages
These recommendations also recognize the unique challenges to prevent
diabetes and its complications among women in different life stages. The
adolescent years (ages 10-17 years) are marked by major biological
and psychosocial changes that transform adolescents into adults. Many
adolescents with diabetes face life choices that can affect their ability
to control the disease. Primary prevention and instituting lifelong healthy
behaviors related to physical activity and nutrition are key in this lifestage.
The reproductive years (ages 18-44 years) represent the life stage
in which women experience significant personal growth and responsibility:
additional schooling, marriage, career development, and child rearing.
Diabetes during pregnancy, regardless of type, puts both a woman and her
unborn child at risk for negative health outcomes. For those with few
personal resources, diabetes during pregnancy can place them at high risk
for negative outcomes and future economic hardship. The middle years
(ages 45-64 years) are noted by major physiological events such as
menopause. This is also a time when other chronic diseases or complications
of diabetes most often first appear, along with many other social and
psychological changes such as disability, death of a significant other
or parent, divorce, and retirement. Because women are increasingly developing
diabetes at younger ages, the development of complications will occur
earlier as well. The older years (ages 65 years and over) are when
women with diabetes become even more vulnerable to other chronic illnesses,
disability, poverty, and loss of social support systems. The number of
women in this age group is growing exponentially as the American population
ages.
Categories of Recommendations
Many of the recommendations for public health action pertain to all women,
regardless of life stage; others are life stage-specific. Presented in
the following two sections of this report, these recommendations are divided
into two categories. Strategy and policy recommendations address
communication and education of families, health care providers, and other
professionals who may serve patients; and services and programs to improve
the effectiveness of interventions in schools, work sites, health care
systems, and other community organizations and settings. Disease Tracking
and research recommendations encourage further knowledge of the epidemiologic,
socioenvironmental, behavioral, translational, and biomedical factors
that influence diabetes and women’s health.
While the focus of these recommendations is to improve the health and
well-being of women, adopting and implementing many of these recommendations
will also benefit men and families.
Top of page
Historical
Page last modified: December 20, 2005
Content Source: National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion
Division of Diabetes Translation
|
Diabetes & Me