Latinos and Diabetes

Carmen Ospina -- Críticas, 1/15/2006

As I read a New York Times series on diabetes this past month, I wondered what public libraries are doing or can do to inform Latinos about the prevalence of the disease in their community. People in East Harlem, a roughly 90% Hispanic and black neighborhood in New York, die of diabetes at twice the rate of people in the city as a whole. Diabetes-related amputations are higher in that neighborhood than in any other part of New York, and for hospitalizations linked to diabetes, East Harlem is the third-worst neighborhood in the city.

Unfortunately, these statistics translate to the Latino community across the United States. According to the American Diabetes Association, approximately two million or 10.2% of all Latinos aged 20 years or older have the disease. In fact, Latinos are 1.5 times more prone to getting type 2 diabetes than non-Latino whites. Statistics show that 24% of all Mexican Americans have the disease and so do 26% of Puerto Ricans and 16% of Cuban Americans between the ages of 45–74.

Latinos suffering from diabetes can reduce their risk for complications if they are educated about their disease, particularly the skills necessary to better control their blood glucose, blood pressure, and cholesterol levels. As you plan your library’s programming this year, you should consider offering informational sessions on the disease or upgrading your Spanish-language resources on the topic. Many Latinos in your community may not know how prone they are to getting diabetes, so you will be doing them a huge service by spelling out the risks. While you organize an informational session, consider directing patrons to this list of online resources featuring information in Spanish:

• LearningAboutDiabetes.com: A great resource for librarians seeking easy-to-understand education materials in English or Spanish. The site offers free patient education handouts, low-cost patient education materials, and creative services to help you develop your own patient education programs. The site was developed by a team of diabetes educators, literacy specialists, and experts in the field of art and design. You’ll find simply written education programs that are appealing and effective with both general and lower-literacy audiences.
• La Diabetes y Los Latinos is the Spanish-language section of the American Diabetes Association’s website.
• Diabetes WebRing offers links to hundreds of websites dealing with diabetes in Spanish.
• The official page of the Spanish Federation of Associations of Educators in Diabetes is dedicated to advancing the role of the diabetes educator. Educational materials (videos, pamphlets, games, etc.) are available in Spanish.
• Diabéticos a list serve created by a group of diabetics from Latin America. They share their experiences in a mailing list for Spanish speakers. To subscribe, e-mail d-org-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

Carmen Ospina
Senior Editor