Family and Community Medicine Centre in Prince Mohammad Bin Abdulaziz Hospital (PMBAH), Al Madinah Al Munawwarah Celebrated World Diabetes Day through organizing an awareness campaign lasted for two days and aimed to educate the center’s visitors about diabetes, its complications and how to prevent it.
In addition, the campaign included a workshop held by Family and Community Medicine Centre in cooperation with many external sides, which included interactive awareness diabetes corners such as initial examination, diabetes prevention, used drugs and teeth’s relation to diabetes. Also, the Ministry of Health represented by a health education team participated in the campaign by holding a corner about general awareness of diabetes which dealt with physical activity and its impact in the prevention and treatment of diabetes. Moreover, Anti-Smoking Association held an awareness corner covering the relationship of smoking with diabetes.
It is worth to mention that this campaign was launched on the 15th of January, 2017 after holding a ceremony hosted by the Family & Community Medicine Centre in Al Madinah Al Munawwarah which brought together more than 50 participants, as the ceremony began with a welcoming speech delivered by the Center's Director, Dr. Turki Al Mutairi, as he welcomed the attendees and praised holding such awareness and educational activities in addition to appreciating the external sides participation. After that, the ceremony organizer’s speech was delivered by Family Medicine Consultant, Dr. Somaiah Al Shreef, as she said that this campaign is of extreme importance since it covers the second cause of death in K.S.A after road accidents, stressing that 70% of obese people are threatened by this disease and it annually costs the Kingdom approximately 10 billion dollars. She mentioned that the Kingdom occupies globally the second place in terms of diabetics numbers and confirmed that the number of diabetics will reach four millions by 2030, if not decisive action taken in this regard. Last but not least, Dr. Somaiah confirmed that the celebration of World Diabetes Day must be kept in mind throughout the year since the diabetes affects the community and all the society groups have to fight it.