Cost Burden of Diabetes Melitus on Nigerian Patient

Cost Burden of Diabetes Mellitus on the Nigerian Patient
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Abstract
According to WHO, diabetes is among the leading cause of mortality globally. The most common types of diabetes include juvenile diabetes, diabetes mellitus, prediabetes, and gestational diabetes. The cross-cutting nature of diabetes makes patients vulnerable to communicable and non-communicable complications. Diabetes imposes a global economic burden on the global economy regarding direct medical costs, premature mortality, negative impact on a country's gross domestic product, and indirect cost associated with productivity loss. The direct medical cost associated with diabetes comprises outpatient and emergency care, self-monitoring expenses, medication, medical supply, long-term care, and in-patient care. In this regard, developing countries such as Nigeria incur a large portion of the diabetes health expenditure burden than high-income countries such as America. Besides the economic burden on the national economy and the healthcare system, diabetes can impose catastrophic medical expenditure on patients and families, resulting in out-of-pocket or cash healthcare payments and the loss of family income. This write-up will explore the complications, symptoms, and risk factors related to diabetes, diabetes mellitus in Nigerian patients, IDF Diabetes Atlas 2021 Nigeria, diagnosis criteria for diabetes, and FDA-approved drugs and insulin for treating diabetes. The paper further discusses the financial burden of diabetes mellitus in Nigeria and a diagonal approach to the healthcare sector in Nigeria and other developing countries.
Diabetes
Poorly controlled diabetes seriously affects kidneys, feet, eyes, blood vessels, nerves, and the heart. Type 2 diabetes is the most prevalent caused by the body becoming resistant to insulin or when the body does not make enough insulin (Zheng et al., 2018). In this regard, diabetes mellitus has risen drastically over the past three years in both developed and developing countries. On the other hand, Juvenile diabetes, also called type 1 or insulin-dependent diabetes, is a condition where the pancreas produces little or no insulin. In the United States, approximately 62 million people have diabetes (Roglic, 2016). Other forms of diabetes include prediabetes, where the glucose levels in the bloodstream are extremely high and can be mistakenly diagnosed as diabetes mellitus. Gestation diabetes develops in particular women during expectancy and goes away after delivery. Other types of diabetes that rarely occur include cystic fibrosis-related diabetes, diabetes insipidus, monogenic diabetes syndromes, and drug or chemical-induced diabetes.
The first WHO Global Diabetes Report approximates 422 million people worldwide in both developing and developed countries with a chronic disease. In 2012 alone, roughly 1.5 million mortality indexes were directly tied to diabetes. For people with diabetes, access to affordable treatment and insulin is vital for survival. In 2019, the 6th leading cause of death in the U.S. was diabetes, with an estimated 244,084 deaths (Saeedi et al., 2019). The ninth edition of Diabetes Atlas estimated that 62 million people in the U.S. are d...