Diabetes in children and social impacts

Diabetes in children and social impacts

by Deleted user -
Number of replies: 4

Diabetes in children and social impacts:

Physical activity is necessary for children who suffer from diabetes. Although exercise is necessary for individuals who have diabetes it can also be dangerous because the combination of too much insulin along with exercise can actually decrease the blood glucose levels and can result in the child becoming Hypoglycemic.

Diabetes can have many social impacts on children and how they are treated differently compared to other kids at school. I remember one example in particular when I was in grade 7, my friend Nicole always felt left out, as sometimes during sports class, the teacher would make her sit on the bench during a football match as she was scared that Nicole’s sugar levels could drop. She was also scared that maybe during tackling amongst an opposite team member, Nicole’s insulin instrument may fall off.

Being in grade 7, children at that age don’t always necessarily understand how to look at the situation so Nicole always felt like she wasn’t good enough at sports. Some other children use to also make fun of her and would say “you’re a bench warmer because you are not good enough”.

 This just goes to say that diabetes in children can have social impacts affecting a child’s character, feelings and can even lead to bullying.

Nathalie

In reply to Deleted user

Re: Diabetes in children and social impacts

by Deleted user -

Hi Nathalie! Thanks for your post, you've raised some really important issues around diabetes. I'm especially interested in the issue you raised about how on the one hand, children need to be doing more exercise, but on the other there is the problem, in diabetic children, of hypoglycaemic effects following activity. It must be very difficult initially for newly diagnosed children to have to handle firstly the diagnosis but then also become acquainted with the finer points regarding their own treatment, as was discussed in the lecture we had.

This article I found explores these issues  in more detail and discusses reducing hypoglycaemia risk by modifying diabetes management following afternoon exercise.

http://ukpmc.ac.uk/articles/PMC2258153/pdf/nihms-39257.pdf

It must have been really difficult for your friend at school with the attitudes she experienced, and I am certain that unfortunately this would be a problem commonly encountered by children with health conditions in schools, especially if they have to have treatment (and in particular ones that are more obvious, e.g. injections), that might break up their usual routine at school. I wonder if more could be done in Personal and Social Education in schools so that young children can learn about what it is like for friends the same age to carry on with life as normal when they have health issues to worry about, perhaps through videos, role plays and class discussion, but tactfully and in a way that did not draw attention to individual students?

In reply to Deleted user

Re: Diabetes in children and social impacts

by Patricia Greenhalgh -

The pdf you posted was from a biomedical perspective. Accurate and clinically helpful, but didn't really consider diabetes as an ILLNESS as opposed to a DISEASE. Most articles don't!  Can anyone find one from a sociological perspective?

In reply to Deleted user

Re: Diabetes in children and social impacts

by Joseph Daniel Jameson -

Am i right in thinking you are talking simply about T1DM?

This post also made me consider T2DM. I find it interesting how these two diseases are often percieved in very different ways. I think T2DM is an interesting 'illness' to explore. Although the biomedical 'disease' process is very similar to that of T1, T2 is often regarded as an almost self-inflicted illness. Whta does self-inflicted imply? Is the rise in T2DM down to individuals or is it, as i believe, down to cultural and societal changes such as sedentary lifestyles and malnutrition.

In contrast with T1DM which will have many psychosocial impacts on children, T2DM could have similar effects on adults. Perhaps these effects aren't as great in adults but the worry is when these psychosocial effects are downplayed to the extent of 'normalising' T2DM to the extent that you hear patients say '...oh yes Dr, that metformin is just for my diabetes....' when they are still clearly overweight and doing no exercise!

At least in T1DM there is an opportunity to educate patients from an early age and influence their health behaviours as adults.

In reply to Joseph Daniel Jameson

Re: Diabetes in children and social impacts

by Patricia Greenhalgh -

Agree Joseph - type 1 and type 2 diabetes are viewed differently by society. When our Olympic athlete Steve Redgrave got diabetes everyone assumed it was type 1 (=> 'personal tragedy'), but actually it was type 2 (seen as "self inflicted")! Of course nobody takes more exercise than Redgrave so we had to revisit all our assumptions about the biomedical aspects of type 2!

Your comments tend to come from a psychological perspective rather than socioloigcal. Most diabeets education programmes look at the individual rather than their social setting. My own work tries to challenge this individualist model - wel'' talk more about that later in the course.