Around 10% of the NHS' UK-wide annual budget is spent on the treatment of diabetes and the complications of diabetes, and it is reported that this number is expected to rise over the coming decades. How can the NHS adapt to ensure that it can continue to treat patients with diabetes, and improve their outcomes, in a way that is sustainable long-term?

A team at Cardiff and Vale UHB may have found a way of working that could offer a solution. We chat to Dr. Lindsay George, a consultant diabetologist, about the work he and his team have been doing to begin to move diabetes care out of hospital and into the community. We also talk about how specialist diabetes consultants are establishing better links with the primary care teams across Cardiff and the Vale of Glamorgan, which is helping to reduce waiting times for patients, and how, by carefully assessing the types of insulin prescribed to diabetic patients in the community, the health board has been able to fund specialist community diabetes nurses, whose presence has resulted in not only a reduction in the cost of diabetes care but also a dramatic improvement in their patients' ability to manage their condition. 

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