In today's era of healthcare technology used for advancing, diagnosing, preventing and treating preventable diseases, simple human interventions are oftentimes overlooked and underrated as measures of combating diseases.
Additionally, some disease states — if caught early — can be avoided and removed from the healthcare equation. One example is pre-diabetes, which is taking a toll on healthcare today .
Diabetes is a devastating chronic illness that predisposes to heart attack, stroke, kidney failure and dialysis, loss of vision, and limb amputation. About 30 million individuals in the U.S. (approximately 10 percent of the US population of 329 million) suffer from diabetes, and this number is steadily growing in epidemic proportions, expected to reach as high as 33 percent by 2050.
The CDC suggests that 84 million Americans (about a quarter of the population) have a condition called pre-diabetes, and nine out of 10 don't know it. Without any intervention, 15 to 30 percent of people with pre-diabetes will convert to type 2 diabetes within 3 to 5 years. Thus, if individuals with pre-diabetes, (those having a mild increase in blood sugar) have sustainable life interventions, the trajectory of this subset of disease progression can be reversed. Additionally, studies in Finland in 2001 and the U.S. in 2002 (funded by the NIH) have shown that lifestyle changes — such as daily exercise and a healthy diet with a modest weight loss — can prevent or delay the progression to diabetes by 58 percent.
Enter the social intervention: man's best friend, the dog.
Medical studies have shown that dog owners who walk their dogs are less likely to develop diabetes and heart disease. In fact, dog owners are 54 percent more likely to get the recommended amount of exercise every day (most likely due to a dog's enthusiasm to exercise for many obvious biologic reasons if nothing else). So, the motivation is consistently there to exercise with your dog not to mention a permanent built in companion who tirelessly will support you and your health.
There are millions of rescue dogs that are perfectly healthy and need of a good home. Studies show over a million unwanted dogs are euthanized each year that otherwise would be a companion animal.
In addition, dogs have an amazing sense of smell and can even be trained as service dogs to detect both low and high blood sugar readings and can alert their human owner of impeding medical issues that might be avoided.
With all the influx of technologies we have seen over the past 10 years and the pressures to conform and adopt them to stay in the healthcare game, the simple social and human factors of healthcare should not be forgotten in this era of preventive health and well-being. These gestures need to be infused whenever possible not only to optimize healthcare and its outcomes but to keep healthcare an art of human care not just technological advancement.
The famed Joslin Diabetes Founder, Elliott P. Joslin, MD, believed the cornerstone to managing diabetes was three-fold: patient involvement, education and empowerment. Dr. Joslin had always encouraged patients to be active and often sent them to the local dog shelter to adopt a walking buddy. A prescription that still holds true today but often forgotten.
So, next time you visit the doctor and they state you have the condition called "pre-diabetes" instead of a medical prescription — ask them for a prescription to adopt a dog. It might just save your life while you save a dog's life as well.