On the occasion of the launch, Dr. Ambrish Mithal stated ?Diabetes is a lifestyle disease and is managed by diet, exercise and medication in that order. Empowerment of the patient and family is best way to manage Diabetes. Every patient should be aware of his ABC ? A1C, Blood Pressure and Cholesterol.?

?The need for a portal was felt by me when I was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes few years back. The discovery also brought about the desire to know more and the first source of information was friends and well wishers. We were told to negate sugar, rice and butter from diet. I was told to ease out on work as I should not take physical exertion. Next we turned to the web and found some excellent information on portals managed in the western world. We were able to clear a lot of our doubts but still the issue of managing an Indian Diet remained. A lot of myths and fallacies on Diabetes got busted in our online learning process? says Sonik describing why he was inspired to launch the portal.

Research says that any form of on-line support to a diabetic results in better management of critical parameters, and hence prevention of complications. This is particularly useful and relevant for professionals who are high-risk for diabetes because of the lack of work-life balance. They are unable to keep pace with doctor's appointments and monitoring.

Sonik describes his experience  When it came to managing, I had to manage the diet and exercise routine. With a schedule that involved travelling 3-4 days a week, finding the right form of exercise and building a routine for the same was a challenge. Similar challenge was there in terms of managing the Tests (HbA1C, lipid profile and eye tests).

A reminder service for same would have worked wonders. Similarly with the doctor consultation, the in city travel is always a challenge and wait time to meet the doctor. Most often the doctor would need only the parameters on Sugar, HbA1C and other such tests. We felt online consultation would help a lot for self as well as for the doctors.

Finally, one has to keep a tab on the medicine reorders to avoid running out of stock at the last minute. Since mostly the insulin and medicines are regular consumption, automated order management and delivery would seem logical service. Another lesser known aspect of diabetes management is availability of "sugar free" and "diet food". Getting the same even in a top of the flight city like Bangalore, Delhi and Mumbai is a challenge; we can well imagine the plight of Tier2 and Tier 3 towns.

The portal aims to be the trusted & preferred internet-based exchange of choice for patients, their families, doctors and health-care professionals, for prevention, detection and management of diabetes for Indians in India and across the globe. Indian Diabetics would find information about Diabetes life style needs such as exercise and diet, while also education on special needs such as care to be taken during travel and extended fasting periods such as Ramadan.

The portal also offers a desktop based application Diabetes Manager to monitor the parameters like Sugar Levels, Diet and medicine ordering reminders. Direction is to make this software available on phone interface to cater to 470M strong mobile phone users in India. Worldwide there are 285M people who are Diabetics and number is likely to increase to 438M by year 2030. According to The International Diabetes Federation, India will account for close to 51 Million Diabetics in 2010, about every 5th Diabetic in the world as an Indian earning India the dubious distinction of being the Diabetic capital of the world. www.indiandiabetics.com

Released by: Sonik Porwal