Many diabetics are informed they must work on lowering their blood pressure as it is one of the common signs of diabetes.

Although high blood pressure is a silent disease, meaning there really is no overt symptoms most patients can explain what the problem is, a simple test at your doctor’s office can tell you within minutes if your body’s circulatory system is creating problems with your heart.

Often, your doctor’s first choice of treatment is another prescription drug which is taken daily by the patient. Along with the major monthly expense of the meds, there is also a host of side effects with most of these medications.

Managing diabetes does not involve just YOU, it will involve a whole Health Care Support Team. Creating a team of health care professionals that you feel comfortable with and that will work with you may take some time to find but in the long run they will become one of your most important TOOLS in the care of your diabetes.

You are the first step in forming this team, as ALL your doctors will be making their professional decisions based on the information that you give them during your routine appointments. Only you and I know how our bodies are affected daily by our diabetes and knowledge of this information will help your primary diabetes doctor give you the best care. It will depend on what type of records you keep on a daily, weekly and monthly basis and I’m a record person and in some ways I probably go a little over board, however, these are the type of records that I keep:

1. Morning, Noon, Dinner and Pre-Bedtime blood glucose levels.
2. Notations of why I may have had high or low blood glucose readings.
3. Medications
4. The total grams of Carbs, Protein and Fat through-out the day.

Pennsylvania has a moderate rate of increase in diabetes hospitalizations, accounting less than 1 per cent over the last two years, however, diabetes is a serious problem in this region. An amount of 8 per cent of adults of this state is affected by diabetes, which is 1 per cent above the 7 per cent people affected throughout the country. Moreover patients from various counties in Western Pennsylvania have high rates of end-stage kidney disease, one complication of diabetes.

The above mentioned situation along with the continuos growing rate in diabetes hospitalizations which increased 9 per cent in the past five years to 23,725 during 2004, make them create a new health program to reduce health care costs through a initiative of health coaches.