Fundraiser, program shine light on diabetes – Mountain View Journal

This Saturdays Notorious Nick Memorial Shotgun Match sponsored by the Single Action Shooting Society and the Founders Ranch Shotgun Sports Club will raise funds for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.

Sign up starts at 8:30 a.m. and shooting begins at 10 a.m. for the event at Founders Ranch at 74 Barton Road. Cost is $50 for 100 target sporting clays, $25 for 50 target 5 stand sporting and $12.50 for 25 target cowboy clays.

The event in its fifth year also brings attention to the causes of juvenile diabetes and diabetes in general, which is a health concern for the area and statewide. According to advocates, more than 12 percent of the states adult population is living with diabetes, which is more than 248,000. Another 615,000 are estimated to have prediabetes, which means their blood sugar levels are higher than normal but not yet high enough to be type 2 diabetes.

Prediabetic is now the new term for people who will likely get diabetes in the future without making changes now to their diet and sedentary lifestyles, said Dr. Linda Stogner, medical director of the Esperanza Family Health Center. Doctors used to call the condition borderline diabetic, but people didnt take the diagnosis serious enough to make significant lifestyle changes.

Brenda Richter, who has been attending a weekly diabetes self-management workshop in Moriarty, said she had been diagnosed as borderline diabetic, which quickly blew up into full diabetes, changing her life. Participants in the workshops held Monday afternoons at Bethel Community Storehouse say the classes have helped them get focused on what they can do to successfully change their lifestyles and diet to better manage the disease.

Danielle Berrien of the Cooperative Extension Service, which sponsored the workshops with the state Department of Health and state Aging and Long Term Services Department, said there is a lot of misunderstanding about the disease, which can lead to kidney failure, blindness, loss of limbs and heart disease. The workshop aims to teach participants about what they can do to better manage the disease by coming up with an action plan with measurable goals to successfully make better food choices and work in more exercising into their daily lives.

You pretty much have to say good bye to processed food, Richter said.

Jennifer White said the workshops have helped her feel less isolated and Effie Zirnheld said the workshops were able to go into more detail than advice given at a doctors office. Participants said it helped that the workshop has Margie Snare as facilitator as she is a person living with diabetes. Berrien said she wants to hold the diabetes workshop twice a year.

Stogner, who has been treating patients in the East Mountains for 30 years, said the disease is one that cuts across all walks of life from mountains residents to flatland farmers. But Stogner said she has patients she has been working with since coming to the area who have been successful in making the necessary lifestyle changes to manage the disease.

I have patients in their 80s who I first saw in their 50s, Stogner said. Im happy to say that none of them have lost their vision, no amputations and no one on dialysis.

Stogner acknowledges that it can be hard for people in rural areas to get good access to unprocessed food. On the exercise side, even taking short walks daily can do a lot to prevent the disease, she said.

Berrien said there are good online resources, such as the websites for the American Diabetes Association, the International Diabetes Center, the Joslin Diabetic Foundation and the National Diabetes Education Program.

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Fundraiser, program shine light on diabetes - Mountain View Journal