12/09/05

New Diabetes Clinics will get underway this week (13 September) at Dilke Memorial Hospital, with the aim of increasing the number of outpatient appointments available to the local population in the Forest of Dean.

The clinics will provide specialist support to patients and bring together key healthcare professionals to help patients manage their diabetes. They will provide advice on how to manage diabetes, support patients who are switching from oral medication to insulin and offer dietetic and health promotion advice and podiatric (foot) assessments.

The clinics will be led by Diabetes Specialist Nurse, Di Kalus, Dietician, Fiona Davis and Podiatrist, Jenny Davies and will run twice a month complimenting the consultant led service provided by Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.

Patients will be referred to the Diabetes Clinic by their GP.

Diabetes Specialist Nurse, Di Kalus explained that the clinics would benefit patients as health professionals would have a shared knowledge of their health and social care needs. She said:

"We are very much looking forward to getting the clinics underway as we help to expand the range of services available closer to home in the Forest. This service will support primary care in providing comprehensive diabetes care and will reduce the requirement for patients to travel to Gloucester for certain treatments."

West Gloucestershire PCT's, Director of Service Delivery, John Ford said:

"This is another new service development at the Dilke and reinforces the importance of our community hospitals in providing services to the local population. The recent review of general practice has shown that patients with diabetes in the Forest already receive a high quality service from GPs and Practice Nurses and this service will compliment this."

Diabetes Specialist Nurse, Di is based at Dilke Memorial Hospital and is helping to provide a diabetes service in the Forest of Dean. She has organised several education groups for patients recently diagnosed with diabetes and has been instrumental in setting up the new clinics.

Di is also involved in supporting, training and educating health care workers in GP surgeries to help increase knowledge of new developments in diabetes care.