If You Have Diabetes
If you have diabetes, you know your body is unable to use and store sugar. This can affect your health by making you tired or thirsty. You may need to urinate frequently. You may even become confused when your blood sugar is abnormal.

The blood sugar changes that cause these symptoms can also damage your eyes. An eye condition known as diabetic retinopathy is a leading cause of blindness. But you don't have to go blind. By taking care of yourself, you can reduce your risk of developing diabetic eye disease.

Because diabetic eye disease often causes no symptoms it is important to have a yearly dilated eye exam.

The National Eye Care Project
Virginia Eye MDs are volunteers for the National Eye Care Project -- the largest public service program in American medical history in the effort to prevent blindness from diabetes.

A national initiative is under way to increase dilated retinal exams among Medicare beneficiaries with diabetes. In Virginia, the Diabetes Initiative will be implemented by the Virginia Health Quality Center (VHQC), the Medicare quality improvement organization that in 1998-1999 led a project with the same goals, targeting areas in Virginia with the lowest eye exam rates.

That project was a resounding success, thanks to the participation of physicians across the state, including Virginia Society of Ophthalmology (VSO) members and the guidance of Kenneth D. Tuck, M.D., then incoming president of the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) and a former member of the VHQC board of directors, and Charles J. Blair, M.D., former Virginia chair of the AAO's Diabetes 2000 initiative, who provided the VHQC with invaluable guidance. Eye exam rates increased by 17 percent each month from July through October 1998, when the project's interventions were fully under way.

Research has shown that cost and transportation are two of the greatest barriers to regular eye care among people with diabetes. The Diabetes Initiative -- a national collaborative effort of the Foundation of the American Academy of Ophthalmology, the American Optometric Association, the Health Care Financing Administration and Peer Review Organizations led by the Texas Medical Foundation -- has been designed to address those barriers. Populations targeted are those at highest risk: Medicare beneficiaries with diabetes who haven't had an eye exam in the past three years.

Eye MDs (ophthalmologists) who volunteer to participate agree to provide, for qualifying Medicare patients, a comprehensive medical eye exam and up to one year of follow-up care for any condition diagnosed at the initial exam, waiving all deductibles and co-payments, and accepting Medicare as payment. The initiative builds upon the AAO's National Eye Care Project (NECP), which will be responsible for matching qualifying patients with volunteer Eye MDs.

In addition to sending an informational letter and brochure on diabetic retinopathy to beneficiaries who haven't had an exam in three years, the VSO and VHQC will also collaborate with primary care physicians, pharmacists, area agencies on aging, parish nurse, and other advocates and providers. The VHQC also is helping to arrange for transportation for patients who need it.

For more information about the NECP, please call the NECP Helpline at 1-800-222-EYES (3937) or visit www.aao.org and click on "Public Information."

The National Eye Care Project is designed for, but not limited to, financially disadvantaged seniors, and is funded by the Foundation of the American Academy of Ophthalmology and the Knights Templar Eye Foundation, Inc.