Cause and Prevention of Type2 Diabetes in Urban China - Essay Example

Rapid economic growth after reformation has lead to lifestyle changes in China's population. Reduced physical activity and unhealthy eating habits inevitably lead to obesity and diabetes, and in fact such lifestyle changes have led to rapid increase in the incidence of Type2 diabetes in urban China. Furthermore, China has now overtaken India as the country with the largest number of diabetes patients in the world, with 50 million patients currently, and an annual incremental rate of 1-2 million.

It is predicted that 100 million of China's 1.3 billion people will have diabetes by 2025. In urban regions of China, around 50% of Type2 patients are children. Type2 diabetes in children is easily overlooked, and delays in treatment can have serious consequences. Hence, medical experts warn that vigilance is essential to prevent and treat the disease in children. Lifestyle intervention will play an important role in diabetes management, particularly because insulin injections are too expensive for the majority of Chinese.

First, a systematic review of existing literature will consider information about the following: causes of Type2 diabetes, medical treatments (effectiveness, cost and benefit), and lifestyle intervention approaches (effectiveness, cost and benefit). Following this, a number of methods will be used to gather and evaluate relevant data. Using the deductive approach will require starting with a general hypothesis; for example, "lifestyle changes are directly increasing incidence of Type2 diabetes and prevention strategies should be implemented".

Inductive research, on the other hand, will allow the researcher to account for the possibility that there may be less obvious influences on the rising frequency of Type2 diabetes in China. A mixture of research strategies designed to obtain qualitative and quantitative data, such as questionnaires and interviews, will be applied on selected groups of diabetics, medical staff, schools, doctors and hospitals. Surveys and questionnaires will gather data used in the deductive approach, while interviews will gather qualitative data for an inductive approach.

Various research methods used together will help cancel out the 'method effect'. (Smith 1975) Face-to-face interviews are essential to this research topic, and gaining qualitative data is the primary focus. Economic evaluation will involve a comparison of the costs and benefits of treatment versus prevention strategies. It is suggested that such a comparison will show that it is far more beneficial from an economic standpoint to prevent diabetes rather than to treat it.FeasibilityPrimary data will be obtained from publications by the World Health Organisation, China's Ministry of Health, and Official Chinese News Agents.

A systematic