A bit of joined up thinking

It takes an election to get me thinking about politics, and well as at May 2014 there are a number of elections happening.

And as I sit and read electoral manifestos I get to thinking - all these worthy wonderful things that people stand for and against, quite often its against in the hope that Mr/Mrs Voter will be of the same mind.

As someone with diabetes though i've never read a manifesto that would have pushed me to vote one party over another.

A strange and silly thing - sure we as people with diabetes in the UK are meant to be bankrupting the NHS - should something so significant not be up there fully exercising those excellent political minds in policy teams in political party HQ's?

The sad reality is no, and diabetes isn't alone, many other conditions, chronic or otherwise simply don't merit thoughts in policy minds, well until someone decides its time to talk about how expensive this or that drug is, or they want to 'deal' with the nations health.

There will be a little jumping on bandwagon, drum beating and all that, but then the next big hot potato will come into sight, like how much the EU commissioners car costs...ok yes there can be big issues that merit the limelight, but quite often when you have a condition as serious as diabetes its disheartening to see a bit of focus raised and be hot news for what..an hour, a day...and then suddenly its nothing until Mr/Mrs MP or Minister thinks they can make political capital out of us.

I don't want to be your political capital, I want action and I want it now!

And what if they ask the question - what action? Well maybe that's part of the problem, diabetes is so complex could I really say where to start?

Simple and honest answer.....no.....but I do have ideas.....if a condition is 'sooooooooo' serious and is costing 'sooooooo' much, why then is there not centralised thinking about how to manage that condition within the whole country?  Its bad enough that devolved administration means Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland will approach the condition differently, but where it really gets messy is England where neighbouring areas can have different policy.

If you;re going to spend so much money on a condition, why is there no obvious bench-marking of good practice, and if there is, how possible is it for each area to implement it if they aren't given equivalent access to resources - and that's not just money, quite often that can be something as simple as a room in which a Diabetes Specialist Nurse can take someone for a chat.

I'm not asking for the moon, i'm not asking for the stars either, what I want is a little bit of joined up thinking