Diabetes Prevention

Our focus goes beyond managing diabetes. We're working to prevent diabetes in people who are most at risk. Our diabetes prevention programs target ethnic groups that have a higher-than-average prevalence of diabetes, including African-Americans and Hispanic-Americans.

Reaching Out to Prevent Diabetes in Young People

Our "Reach-Out" program addresses the increasingly common problem of obesity among children and adolescents - a top risk factor for developing type 2 diabetes. This culturally sensitive program focuses especially on diabetes-prevention efforts for African-American young people in Chicago. Read more about Reach-Out.

Preventing Diabetes in Adults at Risk

The University of Chicago has been a major participant in the ongoing, multi-center Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP), a study funded by the National Institutes of Health/National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Disorders (NIH/NIDDK). Initial results, published in 2002, found that diet and exercise can prevent or delay the onset of type 2 diabetes in certain people at risk (those with impaired glucose tolerance). The study also found that the oral drug metformin also helped to prevent or delay type 2 diabetes, although not as effectively as diet and exercise.

Based on direction from the NIH, this prevention study focused primarily on African-Americans because of the high rate of diabetes among this population group.

Although initial findings were published in 2002 in the New England Journal of Medicine, the University of Chicago Medical Center has received additional funding from the NIH/NIDDK to continue as a clinical study site for this prevention program.

Read more about the Diabetes Prevention Program:

http://medicine.uchicago.edu/section_pages/endo/res_prog_clinical.htm
http://diabetes.niddk.nih.gov/dm/pubs/preventionprogram/index.htm