Finding my way - Healthcare and Medication

[debs248]

I fully understand that others may take an opposite view and that is entirely up to them but personally I prefer to take the advice/ input of a qualified healthcare professional rather than some Dr Google sites which yes can be very useful and informative but others I would not trust at all.As long as you are comfortable that you can distinguish between the two then fine but suggest you stick to professional advice.

Fine if you can afford to pay a professional but I'm dependent on that which is available at low or no cost. I shouldn't have to resort to Dr Google but they're the only resource available to many.

 

[Wendal]

Fine if you can afford to pay a professional but I'm dependent on that which is available at low or no cost. I shouldn't have to resort to Dr Google but they're the only resource available to many.

I meant a healthcare professional rather than paying for advice so should have made that clearer so “ professional” in sense of qualified and objective.
So meant accessing the NHS which is free at the point of access rather than private healthcare.
Equally when I refer to Dr Google I mean sone sites provide an informative and unbiased service and those are fine but there are a host of others which I would simply not trust as offering impartial advice imo.

 

[debs248]

So meant accessing the NHS which is free at the point of access rather than private healthcare.
Equally when I refer to Dr Google I mean sone sites provide an informative and unbiased service and those are fine but there are a host of others which I would simply not trust as offering impartial advice imo.

Thank you for explaining. I have had minimal success getting answers from the NHS in my area, and don't believe changing surgeries will help.

When NHS professionals won't help, I turn to other people who give their advice freely on the forum, who are not professional but are actually willing to give of their time and considered thought. I know you disagree but presumably you have been lucky with your GP surgery/ diabetes team and not needed to turn elsewhere. Long may it continue for you and I hope it becomes the norm soon.

 

[Wendal]

Thank you for explaining. I have had minimal success getting answers from the NHS in my area, and don't believe changing surgeries will help.

When NHS professionals won't help, I turn to other people who give their advice freely on the forum, who are not professional but are actually willing to give of their time and considered thought. I know you disagree but presumably you have been lucky with your GP surgery/ diabetes team and not needed to turn elsewhere. Long may it continue for you and I hope it becomes the norm soon.

Thanks Debs for been so understanding and yes I am very lucky in that my GPs are very supportive and I can only say they have been really accessible in terms of appointments etc.
I also appreciate I have a reasonable understanding of drugs in general and how they work and again have never suffered from any side effects of any treatment or Vaccines so I will likely have a different perspective to say someone who had a bad reaction to a particular treatment.
Anyway once again thanks for your considered reply.

 

[Drummer]

After my diagnostic test I got a phone call from my GP clinic to make an appointment for ten days later.
I asked what for and he said it was a routine follow up and nothing to worry about - at the appointment he told me it was something to be taken seriously as I was a very bad diabetic.
I didn't actually call him a lying toad, but I did think it.
On the way home I called at the butcher and ordered a whole lamb - next day I used the diet sheets I'd been encouraged to follow, to light the barbecue.

 

[JITR]

How did you sort the 'wheat from the chaff'?

By sticking to diabetes.co.uk, diabetes.org.uk and the nhs website. If they all agree on something I'll accept it. Anything less universally agreed I'll raise a question on the forum and if there's consensus from long-term members I'll tend to accept that advice.

I'm not a medic but I have a scientific background and a robust bull**** detector. Don't see what else I can do really.

@debs248

'Official' websites can lag behind the times. In most fields, I find it pays to go back to source of authoritative documents. T2D is no exception.

For instance Prof Roy Taylor's Counterpoint Study (c 2008) is not as well known as it should be. This PDF shows the results in a series of slides; #8 was pivotal for me.



This shows 'responders' to a very low calorie diet can bring their fasting glucose down to normal in seven days; mine was in double digits. Responders are T2Ds whose beta cells are not irreparably damaged; this includes the vast majority of the newly diagnosed.

The selling point of this discovery for me in December 2022 was not to take diabetes medication for the rest of my life as the GP had intimated. The Metformin tablets and their side effects could remain in the bag and, hopefully, I would be in remission after losing the first 15 kg of my 22 kg target to get my waist back to normal. Would I be a responder?

On 22 December I informed the GP about my plan. She had not heard of Prof. Taylor or ways to achieve remission; she advised taking Metformin following NICE guidelines, but she did not advise against the VLCD. On 23 December I had the scan she had arranged to see whether my alarming iron levels (ferritin) had damaged my liver. Fortunately they hadn't but the radiologist said I had a fatty liver (as Prof Taylor would have expected) and the treatment was diet.

I started my VLCD real food diet on Chtistmas Eve. On New Year's Eve my prick test came out at 5.8 mmol/l. So I carried on with a protein and vegetable diet while keeping and eye on my nutrients and weight. So far HbA1c tests have confirmed I am the right track with a couple of blips due to gastroenteritis.

There are some other source documents I'd suggest. That's for another post.