Letter From The Editor

Editor's Desk: Insulin for DKA - Not always a good choice!

Every time we hear of a patient with DKA we think "Trip to the Emergency Room," and "Insulin Drip Immediately." However starting insulin without doing certain labs first can make things worse not better. This week's Disaster Averted points...

Letter from the Editor #626:

Each week I see insulin using patients who are not in control. It doesn't seem to matter if they are type 1 or type 2, old or young, rich or poor, they all have high A1c's and wide swings in blood glucose levels. When we look carefully we find that...

Editor's Desk: Getting Your Patients on Track with GLP-1s

I am often in a position to recommend the selection of medications for the patients with type 2 diabetes who I see in prescribers' offices.   Most medical practitioners will make metformin their first choice as this has...

Editor's Desk DCMS #84

Is it intensity or duration that gives the best results when you exercise? This week's Clinical Text helps us to maximize both for our patients and...

Letter from the Editor #625

I was at a program last week and we were talking about testosterone replacement in men and how our patients often go for years with low levels. There was a lot of conversation about testing and why it does not get done and one of the prescribers in...

Editor's Desk: Improving Safety May Be Easier than You Think

Did you know that standardizing the delivery process of high-alert medications and implementing hospital-wide protocols are key to maximizing safety in the hospital? The ways to do this are often simpler than you think, and our Homerun...

Letter from the Editor #624

The diabetes epidemic keeps finding younger victims and these 10 to 17-year-olds with type 2 diabetes need much more aggressive care than we have been willing to give them. This week's first item,

Editor's Note: Hyperglycemia and Exercise, and the Most Error-prone Drug

Do you know the two situations when exercise can cause a dangerous rise in blood glucose? To find what these two situations are and how to treat them, be sure to check out this week's

Letter from the Editor #623: Focus on GLP-1

The use of GLP-1 analogs is up again this year as clinicians become more comfortable with the class of drugs and more patients are learning about the benefits of these analogs from their practitioners, friends, and websites and blogs on the...

Editor's Note: Dealing with Changes in Practice Methods

Last week's Disaster Averted

Letter from the Editor #622: Exercise, Sleep, and Eat Your Breakfast!

Have you ever noticed that when patients get older they become more scared of falling? Many times they will stop their physical activities because of this fear, which is not a good idea for our diabetes patients. Sheri R. Colberg, PhD...

Editor's Note, DCMS #80: SMA's and Patient Gossip

Have you ever done a shared medical appointment (SMA) in your office? One of our local doctors tried it and learned how patients can be their own worst enemies....

Letter from the Editor #621: Paula Deen and Staying on the Program

Yesterday I was flipping through the channels and stopped at the Food Channel when I saw that Paula Deen was on. Most of us are aware of the media frenzy when she came out and admitted she had diabetes, and all the public snafu's that followed....

Editor's Note, DCMS #79: New Joslin Excerpt

When my interns come to my rotation they have to live like they have type 2 and type 1 diabetes and this includes injecting themselves with saline based on calculating their insulin dose. A couple of years ago I was discussing this with an...

Letter from the Editor #620: It's All about the Pounds This Week...

It's all about the pounds this week in the latest and best articles on the internet from our staff here at Diabetes in Control. The research is exploding in various ways to fight the diabetes, weight, and cholesterol triad. Exercise and...

Editor's Note, DCMS #78: Pill Holder Causes Diabetes

Pill holder causes diabetes ... or so it seems. This week's Disaster Averted comes from one of our advisory board members, Dr Raymond Raitz of Palmetto, Fl. Last week he shared an interesting story about 

Letter from the Editor #619: The Benefits of Mentoring and Metformin

We have all heard the phrase "Misery Loves Company," and often times when someone is diagnosed with diabetes, their friends with diabetes bond with them so that they can both "suffer" from the disease. This week we have the results of a study from...

Editor's Desk DCMS #77: Honest A1c Results

Have you ever had a patient who tells you that their readings are all under 150mg/dl but then their A1c is 9.5? Often we scratch our heads and wonder why these patients are less than honest about their readings. There could be another reason...

Letter from the Editor #618: Are You Exercising?

This week, our publisher, Steve Freed, wants to know if you are setting a good example for your patients by engaging in...

Editor's Desk: Top Tools for Your Practice

The amount of medical information concerning diabetes which we receive on a daily basis from a multitude of sources is enormous. A lot of this knowledge blitz is aimed at helping you help your patients but this has led to the near impossible task...

Editor's Note: Reading the Whole Label

A lot of times we just read the first part of a sentence and then fill in the rest mentally without realizing that we may be missing something out of the ordinary. This week our Diabetes Disaster takes a look at

Letter from the Editor #617: OTC Meds for Diabetes, Hypertension and Cholesterol – You've Got to Be Kidding Me!

OTC Meds for Diabetes, Hypertension and Cholesterol – You've Got to Be Kidding! This week we have an interesting item (Item #3,

Editor's Desk #75: New Clinical Text from Joslin

Do you have nine seconds to improve your patients' care? According to the new JOSLIN’S DIABETES DESKBOOK -- A Guide for Primary Care Providers, Updated 2nd Edition those 9 seconds could make the difference in...

Letter from the Editor #616: Debunking Diabetes Myths

Last week I learned something new about fruits and diabetes. According to something someone told one of my new patients, if you eat organic fruits they will not raise your glucose levels. Now we know that this is not true...

Editor's Note DCMS #74: New Homerun Slides

We all know that diabetes has reached an epic level in this country and the prospects for improvement in the near future are not that great. Since patients are getting the disease sooner it is likely that they will also need increased care as...

Letter from the Editor #615: Qnexa FDA Advisory Panel Approval

When it comes to weight loss medications the FDA's motto appears to be, "If at first you don't get approval, try, try, again," and it worked as an FDA advisory panel recommended the approval of Qnexa after two previous rejections (

Letter from the Editor #614: The Blood Sugar Roller Coaster

Last week I walked into the pharmacy and heard a call over the intercom, "Manager to deli, please." I didn't think anything of it until the manager called me back to the deli because one of his employees was lying on the...

Editor's Note #73: When Half of 12 is Not 6!

We have seen that many of our diabetes patients also have hypertension and or elevated lipids and are often referred to as suffering from cardiometabolic syndrome. Over the past couple of months, Stan Schwartz, MD, FACP, has been educating us...

Editor's Note DCMS #72: Averting Potential Insurance Requirement Disasters

We all know how hard it is to prescribe the right medication for a patient while not having it rejected for non-formulary or prior auth requirements, but do we ever think about how these insurance rules can lead to a disaster? This week we...

Letter from the Editor #613: Dr. Richard Kahn Comment, Joslin's Response and Your Comments

Last month, Richard Kahn, M.D., the former chief scientific officer for the American Diabetes Association, stated that even though weight loss can prevent or delay the onset of diabetes, these prevention programs are a "waste of resources"...

Editor's Note: Ranolazine and A1c

Ranolazine is a medication used for the prevention of angina which also seems to have a positive effect on A1c. This makes it a very important drug for cardiometabolic treatment according to Stan Schwartz MD, FACP, Clinical Associate...

Letter from the Editor #612: Diet Sodas, Good or Bad?

An article in Science Daily this week caught my eye. According to a new study there is a potential link between daily consumption of diet soft drinks and the risk of vascular events. Individuals who drink diet soft...

Editor's Note: "Take As Directed"

Each day in the pharmacy we get prescriptions with the three scariest words in medicine: "Take as directed." Since diabetes patients on average take seven medications it's impossible to expect them to remember how to take all of them and this...

Letter from the Editor #611: DEWL Results and "Low-Carb"

This week there is a wealth of information on new drugs for diabetes and weight loss; see FDA Approves Eli Lilly Diabetes Combo Drug...

Editor's Note: Special Edition - Weight Loss

As the month of January draws to a close it is that time when New Year's Resolutions start to unravel. Many of our patients tried the newest fad diet or exercise program for a whopping 30 days and when they didn't get the results that the TV...

Letter from the Editor #610

Steve and I are constantly going to physician offices to talk about in-office diabetes education and the value for patients of coming in for monthly classes or group appointments. We even spent three months last summer giving you

Editor's Desk: Pregnancy and Diabetes

Whenever we talk about diabetes and pregnancy the first thing that comes to mind is gestational diabetes associated with pregnancy in otherwise healthy patients. But what about those patients who have diabetes and then get pregnant? This week our...

Letter from the Editor #609: Paula Deen and the Shift in Cooking Shows

There was a lot of excitement in the lay press this week as Southern style TV Chef Paula Deen came out of the closet and admitted she has had diabetes for the last three years. It was interesting to note that this occurred after she signed a...

Editor's Note DCMS #67: Adolescents and the Process of Change

It has been said that, "People cannot influence their motivation and actions very well if they do not pay adequate attention to their own performances, the conditions under which they occur, and the immediate and distal effects they produce."...

Letter from the Editor #608

Over the past two years there have been numerous postponements of the enactment of Medicare's sustainable growth rate (SGR) formula for physician pay. The SRG was an original attempt to reduce the reimbursements to physicians for Medicare...