National Survey Indicates Latinos and Blacks in America Twice as Likely as Caucasians to Be Diagnosed with Diabetes

Biomedical community to host congressional briefing to present community-level
programs to fight this growing epidemic
WASHINGTON--(Business Wire)--
CHI:

WHO:
-- Gary Puckrein, Ph.D., president and chief executive officer, National Minority Quality Forum
-- Amparo Gonzalez, director, Georgia Latino Diabetes Education Program at Emory University School of Medicine
-- Congresswoman Lucille Roybal-Allard (D-CA 34)
-- David Gollaher, Ph.D., president and CEO, CHI-California Healthcare Institute

WHAT: CHI will hold a briefing to raise awareness of diabetes in underserved populations and present tools and community-level programs that enable prevention, early detection, and treatment of diabetes. Puckrein will introduce the Diabetes Atlas (D-ATLAS) as a tool for legislators to learn about the prevalence of diabetes in their own districts; Gonzalez will provide an overview of her organization`s efforts to educate the Latino community about diabetes.

WHEN: Thursday, July 16, 2009, 9:30 to 11:00 a.m.

WHERE: Capitol, Room HC-7

ABOUT DIABETES:
-- Diabetes is the fifth-deadliest disease in America, and it has no cure.
-- 20.8 million adults and children in the U.S. have diabetes.
-- National surveys indicate that the prevalence of type 2 diabetes in Latinos and blacks is almost twice as high as found in non-Latino Caucasians.
-- Latinos have higher rates of end-stage renal disease, caused by diabetes.
-- People with diabetes are two to four times more likely to suffer strokes and once having had a stroke, are two to four times as likely to have a recurrence.

RSVP: Tiffany Taluban, taluban@chi.org, 858-456-8891

ABOUT D-ATLAS:

The National Minority Quality Forum (NMQF) Diabetes Atlas (D-ATLAS) is a unique
tool that graphically maps diabetes prevalence, using zip-code-level data. This
Web-based resource provides the user with on-demand capacity for comparing and
contrasting the prevalence of type 2 diabetes nationwide, by state, and by
congressional district thereby demonstrating and focusing attention on
disparities in precise geographical areas and communities. To learn more visit
http://www.nmqf.org/.

About The Georgia Latino Diabetes Education Program:

The Georgia Latino Diabetes Education Program aims to provide a comprehensive
and culturally appropriate diabetes education to Latino/Hispanic patients with
diabetes and their families throughout the state of Georgia. And to educate and
provide Spanish diabetes education material to physicians and healthcare
providers who will in turn provide a turnkey consumer education program to their
Latino patients with diabetes. To learn more visit
http://www.medicine.emory.edu/endo/diabetes/educ/latino.cfm.

About CHI:

CHI represents more than 250 leading biotechnology, medical device, diagnostics,
and pharmaceutical companies, and public and private academic biomedical
research organizations. CHI`s mission is to advance responsible public policies
that foster medical innovation and promote scientific discovery. CHI`s Web site
is www.chi.org.

CHI
Tiffany Taluban, 858-456-8891
taluban@chi.org

Copyright Business Wire 2009