Has your diabetes team engaged with you irrespective of covid or not?

Status
Not open for further replies.
Leo

Leo

Well-Known Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 1.5 LADA
I’d love to hear from you all about your diabetes care from your team since covid hit. Have you experienced the usual amount of contact and engagement or have things… well dropped off a little/stopped completely?
Please do let me know as I’d love to compare experiences!
Looking forward to this one!
 
Had a review in June via phone with consultant. It was a lovely surprise as expecting my DSN to ring. Only reason I have a review is because I'm on a pump, I'm self sufficient with my management most of the time and couldn't care less if I have a review or not.
 
Since Covid began, I have seen the team at my local hospital clinic at least as frequently as before. I have seen the consultant in charge of the pump clinic twice this year and she has seemed very tired and stressed, explaining that dealing with Covid wards has taken a lot of her energy, preventing her from being on top of technological developments. Even so, she has been excellent, always listening carefully and working to find solutions. I find the hospital team impressive, they give of their very best, even if time and resources are lacking. So far as diabetes is concerned, I don't have much to do with the GP surgery, and have not met anyone there who claims to know about it.
 
I’ve had video appointments with the hospital but less often than usual, maybe once per 9-12 months not 6. Haven’t had an in person appointment and haven’t had the annual checks (blood pressure, feet, etc) with my GP nurse since at least January 2019, but they didn’t check my feet then, so a few years for those.
 
Had everything as normal.
Well to be fair, I declined the foot tests, and kept the eye, weigh ins, and blood screening up, did the follow ups by phone, but by agreement with my HCP as they know I have it in hand, and they respect I seem to know what I'm doing.
 
Noting face to face since diagnosis over a year ago. No blood tests. A couple of phone calls from dietician who tells me to eat porridge. Never had feet checked, blood pressure cholesterol etc. was scheduled for a review in jan and that hasn’t happened. However I did receive a letter yesterday saying my next appointment was with the dietician on 7th April 21’ ! So I called them because obviously that’s months ago, they told me it was a typo, so I asked do I have any appointments coming up with the endo/DN she said not before April next year no. I have a diabetic uncle who is under the same team and he had kidney bloods borderline over a year ago. Couldn’t get to see anybody since then and his health deteriorated last week, ended up in A&E and is now on being moved to another hospital where the assumption is that he will end up on dialysis. To be fair I am not in any urgent need of care, I’m fortunate that I’m able to pay private for a1cs etc, I’ve done this assuming that we were all in the same boat but sounds like you guys are receiving good care which is great because I found it unsettling how many complications may be going undetected. This isn’t a rant, I don’t feel sorry for myself I’m genuinely happy this isn’t the case for everyone. I was lucky enough to get the libre and I’m very grateful for that. I understand that hospitals have had to make some difficult decisions but most doctors round my way are still refusing to see anyone (including mine). All the best everyone xx
 
Last edited:
Leo said:
I’d love to hear from you all about your diabetes care from your team since covid hit. Have you experienced the usual amount of contact and engagement or have things… well dropped off a little/stopped completely?
Please do let me know as I’d love to compare experiences!
Looking forward to this one!
Click to expand...
Looks like I’m in the minority Leo! Which is great news. Great thread btw
 
I had a couple of phone reviews last year which was a surprise because I usually only have annual (13 monthly) reviews. These were preceded by a blood test at my surgery - nothin more than the phlebotomist taking bloods and sending them away to the lab so I had some numbers to discuss on the phone.
My face to face eye tests have continued annually.
This year, I had a face to face diabetes review at the hospital clinic.

My preference is for the remote phone calls as it is far more efficient of my time - no waiting in waiting rooms and no travel to the clinic.
 
I had my review with the practice nurse, blood tests and consultant appointment and eye screening just before the first lock down in Feb 2019 which was probably quite fortuitous timing. Since then I have had 2 telephone appointments with the consultant and bloods taken for those appointments by the practice nurse and a toe tickle, weight and BP this summer and eye screening. This has all been slightly less frequent than previously but only slightly and I am managing fine now that I have Libre so to be honest, more attention that I actually really need, although the eye screening was something that I was keen for as I had background retinopathy at the previous check, so may have been shortlisted because of that. I think they may have reduced the frequency of screening for people who have no problems/concerns to 2 years to try to catch up with the backlog.
I was reading something the other day which mentioned about more rural communities having better GP care particularly through the pandemic and that bears out in my case although my GP practice is very well run generally.
 
I’ve had the usual 6 months reviews by my hospital doctor but, by phone & had to go to the hospital beforehand for blood tests. I had a review in July & the next one is 02/11/21 & just had the blood tests done on Tuesday. In between those hospital reviews I’ve also had Hba1c done by my health centre every 6 months as well so, I’m well covered with Hba1c every 3 months & I’ve fluctuated by 1 or 2 with 61 to 63 this year: been around that since 2018 anyway; so Covid hasn’t made that go up even though it’s been much more of a struggle & increased insulin as I’m testing more to stay on top of things!
 
Ok… I take it back! I am starting to feel a little sorry for myself 🙄
 
I don't think I exist any more. Zero contact for months but then they can see things are going well. Trouble is if thjngs get worse I might not ge aware and they certainly won't until some intervention is needed. Not very proactive if you ask me.

Do GPs still exist?
 
I’ve managed more care during the pandemic!
I had just been referred back to the hospital to see if I could get the Libre on prescription, when all routine appointments were cancelled. However, after a few weeks delay, I got a phone appointment, was told they’d put me forward to the committee for a decision on the Libre. Then I heard nothing for 6 months, and I did end up having to make a nuisance of myself to get a decision, but then I got a date for an online training webinar, and got a Libre prescription. It took a year from actually being referred, but three months of that was pre-pandemic, waiting for an appointment. Since then, I've had a follow up telephone consultation and another one coming up in December.
My routine bloods and feet tickling were done at the surgery at the usual time, and I had a telephone conversation with the surgery diabetes nurse.
I've just had a letter through to make an appointment for retinal screening, my appointment for April 2020 was cancelled, so I haven’t been seen since April 2019.
So it’s all happening, just a bit more slowly, but as it’s all routine, and I don’t have any urgent problems, that’s fair enough.
 
Last edited:
I had contact around a remote pump start in the first lockdown, but my annual pump clinic was a bit delayed, and only happened in the Autumn rather than January. These were both hospital-based. I’ve not had my regular annual GP appointment.

Eye screening appointment has just come through in the past week or so.

So my feeling is that it’s GP appointments which are under the most pressure.
 
Last review was in January 2020 face to face, only contact with a DSN was when I contacted them, she said she'd call back the following week, I'm still waiting and this was months ago, had a video call with consultant August but wasn't asked to get tests etc

I know my consultant was diverted to deal with the pandemic but a little more support from the DSN would have been handy for me seen as I'm struggling mentally etc but I'll just continue to go through it alone
 
My daughter has continued to have 3-monthly checkups although some have been over the phone, at first because the in-person clinics shut down completely for a few months and then we had to change a couple to phone because we were isolating due to cases at school. So didn’t get any blood tests or anything done for a year, to be fair though things are fairly stable for us so we probably aren’t a priority for that. No retinopathy check last year (due July, finally got it done August this year) again no problems though and I know they were prioritising people who were more likely to need help on that one.
In the last year we have been in and out of the GP surgery fairly regularly for various reasons not diabetes related, long before Covid appeared they had started doing telephone calls first to triage you and then only booking face to face appointments if they thought you really needed one. I think the intention was to try to cut down on the number of people who book appointments and then don’t turn up. I find it works OK like that though and we’ve always managed to get face to face appointments when necessary without any difficulty. I think our surgery are very good though in that respect and we’ve always been able to get appointments when we needed them even before covid and when other people have complained that it’s almost impossible to get one at their surgery.
I do wonder if they prioritise children though, and i think we have an exceptionally good hospital team, am quite nervous about how things might change once my daughter turns 18 and has to transfer to adult services!
 
Out of interest, how often do people usually engage with their diabetes team outside of the pandemic?

I ask because I see comments such as "I haven't seen/spoken to anyone for months" But I don't expect to hear from anyone for months. Typically, it is at least 13 months between my "annual" reviews and some years it has been longer.
 
Now I’ve come to think of it, I haven’t had my annual eye check up in 2 years since the start of Covid lockdown in 2020! 😱

I think it’s due to by ongoing liver problems & the delays due to Covid on that front both my hospital team & health centre are keeping a closer eye on me! I’ve been getting regular liver function blood tests every 6 to 8 weeks at my health centre anyway & in these two years it has been slowly getting worse but, not to the extent of medication, yet! So, I may well be getting more attention that others while things have been delayed!
 
helli said:
Out of interest, how often do people usually engage with their diabetes team outside of the pandemic?

I ask because I see comments such as "I haven't seen/spoken to anyone for months" But I don't expect to hear from anyone for months. Typically, it is at least 13 months between my "annual" reviews and some years it has been longer.
Click to expand...
I am on 6 monthly (ish) appointments with the consultant with still being relatively newly diagnosed (2.5 years) and annual with the diabetes trained nurse who oversees the diabetics at the practice. I would be happy to drop back to annual consultant appointments as I feel I have a good handle on things now but consultant wants it to remain at 6 months for now. I have no idea if that is standard for all Type 1s or maybe I just brighten his day 🙂 😉 rather than having to deal with some of the "moany patients" I have met in the waiting rooms on occasion!
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top