Ahmedabad is the diabetes capital of India

With world's largest cases of diabetes reported here, India can easily be called the diabetes capital of the world. But Ahmedabad is also the diabetes capital of the country with highest diabetes prevalence rate said a paper presented by Dr Banshi Saboo in the 37th annual conference of Research Society for Study of Diabetes in India (RSSDI) which concluded on Sunday.

Briefing about the outcome of the conference Dr Urman Dhruv, chairman, scientific sessions committee, RSSDI-2009, said that Ahmedabad has 13.8% prevalence rate of diabetes patients, whereas other 11 major cities have prevalence rate in the range of 6-8%.

"About 25,000 people visited the diabetes Awareness Exhibition alone and benefited from the program regarding diabetes. During the conference and Public awareness activities, over 4,270 people tested for blood sugar" said Dr Banshi Saboo, organising Secretary, RSSDI 2009.

The last day of the conference started early at 6 am with ‘Diabetes Walk' that was part of Public Awareness mega campaign 'project KADAM'.

"More than 2,700 delegates participated which is the highest participation so far, and 114 research papers were presented during the four day meet. Discussions by specialists continued for 84 hours on the disease" said Dr Dhruv.

The best 6 out of 100 research papers were presented on the 3rd day of the conference. Research papers from Bengaluru, Chandigarh, Vellore, Salem and Kolkata managed to find their place too.

The prominent features of the Continuous Education Program (CME) remained the picture demonstration by Dr M Rema, Chennai on the subject of 'Diabetic Retinopathy' and a program chaired by Dr SD Mehtalia on the 'Less-known complications of diabetes'. Total 48 lectures were presented by 32 experts from Delhi, Madurai, Lucknow, Vizag, Nagpur, Kolkata and Chennai.