World Diabetes Day - 2011

Focus on "Neonatal and Infantile Diabetes"

International Diabetes Federation (IDF) and World Health Organization (WHO) have established World Diabetes Day, every year on November 14th, to improve diabetes advocacy worldwide and to promote the global awareness campaign of diabetes prevention and care.

Dr. P. Jeyachandran, Director and Superintendent, Institute of Child Health and Hospital for Children, Chennai presided over the function and inaugurated the ‘Neonatal and Monogenic Diabetes Registry’. Dr. V. Poovazhagi, Asst. Prof. of Paediatrics, Diabetes Clinic, Institute of Child Health and Hospital for Children, Chennai was honoured for her work in the field of neonatal and juvenile diabetes. The guest of honour for this function was Actor/Producer Mr. T. Prashanth.

Dr. V. Mohan, Chairman and Managing Director, Dr. Mohan’s Diabetes Specialities Centre (DMDSC) said, “To commemorate this year World Diabetes Day on November 14th, we have organized a very special event to honour our “little stars”, namely children with Neonatal Diabetes.  Neonatal Diabetes is diagnosed within the first 6 months of life. Although it is a rare condition, physicians, diabetologists and pediatricians need to be sensitized about these conditions in children as this condition can otherwise be missed altogether”.

Dr. R.M. Anjana, Jt. Managing Director, DMDSC added “Some of the Neonatal Diabetes children may have genetic mutations and hence we are routinely screening for these mutations. In our attempt to create a National Registry of Neonatal and Monogenic Diabetes, we have started a website called www.neonataldiabetes.in”.  

Dr. Ranjit Unnikrishnan, Vice Chairman, DMDSC added “Identifying these mutations can help us in planning treatment for these children. Some children can even present with Neonatal hypoglycemia or low sugar reactions”.

Dr.Radha Venkatesan, Head, Dept of Genetics at MDRF who carried out the genetic mutations at the Madras Diabetes Research Foundation said that “So far about 40 children have been tested with Neonatal Diabetes at their centre. Several novel mutations have been identified”.

Ms. K. Jahnavi, Research Fellow in Genetics at MDRF who carried out the details of the screening gave further details “10 child had the sulphonylurea (SUR) mutations, 3 had KCNJ11 mutations where 3 Insulin gene (INS) mutations”.