Otero County Program Director Kelly Knight will host a diabetes workshop regularly in October and November aimed at sharing resources and educating those suffering from the chronic disease.
Since 2020 diabetes was diagnosed in 11.2% of New Mexico’s population, according to New Mexico’s Indicator Based Information System. In Otero County that percentage of diagnosis is slightly lower ― 10.3% ― but, Knight said, indicates a need for continued education.
The six-week session focusing on Type II diabetes is free. It will be held every Thursday from 9 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. Monitoring blood sugar levels and healthy eating will be among the topics covered during the workshop.
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Participants will be given free resources during the classes including books pertaining to healthy living habits. Past workshop sessions featured “Living a Healthy Life with Chronic Conditions” and “The Four-Ingredient Diabetes Cookbook.”
Knight said 10 spots will be filed on a first-come-first-served basis, but are open to receiving more participants.
“The workshops cover a lot of topics on how to better manage living with this, so they aren’t just another statistic,” Knight said. “This helps people with just having a better day to day living experience and live healthier with a chronic condition.”
In a 2013 to 2017 study found on New Mexico’s Indicator Based Information System website, the mortality rate related to diabetic deaths in Alamogordo alone were found to be worse than the average for the United States.
The mortality rate per 100,000 people was 26.2 in Alamogordo and 21.2 in the United States.
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“We determine the need of these workshops by looking at these numbers in Otero County and the state, so we look at what the prevalence is of diagnosed diabetes rate,” Knight said. “This is how we come up for the need of these workshops and why they are important.”
Knight said she and Maureen Schmittle, health promotion specialist in Otero County for the Department of Health, will facilitate the workshop sessions.
Shirley Dakin a registered dietician and certified diabetes care and education specialist said that residents that take advantage of these workshops come out with optimism and make improvements to their health after she meets with them.
“As a diabetes educator I can attest to the fact that diabetes self-management programs actually help people learn how to manage their diabetes better by teaching them the skills to use at home, to monitor their blood sugars, to take their medications correctly, to eating healthy and getting active,” Dakin said. “This can lead to preventing long term complications and improving their quality of life.”
Dakin said a lot of people diagnosed with diabetes tend to isolate themselves because they think they are the only ones going through these types of problems and challenges. She said they don’t like to open up about these issues.
“Once they realize there are these types of programs out there, I have had many people over the course of my career that are very grateful and thankful to find something where they could open up to and have support long term,” Dakin said. “That’s a big advantage because with chronic diseases, the daily stress can really cause people to isolate themselves and programs like these teach them they’re not alone.”
Dakin said she really emphasizes to people that they do not have to make major changes in their lives to control these conditions, but they can make minor, simple changes and if they are able to start with that, they’ll see long term benefits.
Information for the upcoming workshop by Knight and Schmittle can be found by calling 575-437-0231. The workshops will be held on Thursdays throughout October and November at the Otero County Extension Service Center, located at 401 Fairgrounds Road in Alamogordo.
Juan Corral can be reached at JCorral@gannett.com or on twitter at @Juan36Corr.
