Depression + Diabetes = Living at 60% Health
by Tony Chen
Today, the WHO released results of a research project based on 240k people in 60 countries: 9-23% of people who suffer from one of the “Big 4″ chronic diseases (diabetes, asthma, arthritis, angina) also have depression. Out of the 4, diabetes + depression was the worst combination. The WHO researcher said:
We report the largest population-based worldwide study to our knowledge that explores the effect of depression in comparison with four other chronic diseases on health state…Our main findings show that depression impairs health state to a substantially greater degree than the other diseases
In some sense, there will be a substantial number of diabetics that won’t ever effectively manage their diabetes until they manage their depression. Even if we give them all the “diabetes education” and “case management” resources in the world, they may not be able to get their blood sugars and lipids in line.
This goes back to what Nick Jacobs has been saying for a long, long time. It’s common sense that is increasingly uncommon - ignore the soft / human / emotional / right-brained side of health care at your peril.
