Visitors can learn about all aspects of diabetes at the World Diabetes Day 2011 exhibition at the International Conference Center in Berlin, which will take place on November 13, 2011 from 9:30 AM to 3:30 PM. The German Center for Diabetes Research (DZD) is also participating in the exhibition with an interactive booth, which has been organized by DiabetesDE.
Exhibits and information for all age groups
At its interactive booth at the World Diabetes Day exhibition, the German Center for Diabetes Research informs visitors about diabetes in a fun and playful manner. It points to possibilities of diabetes prevention and provides the latest news and findings from diabetes research.
A hall of mirrors serves as a reminder that being overweight is associated with a higher diabetes risk. Visitors can take the German Diabetes Risk Test® and learn how they can actively reduce their risk. Informative texts and film clips show what researchers are working on at the DZD to maintain the body’s own insulin production that is impaired in diabetes and to develop new treatment methods. In audio files, affected individuals such as the star hairdresser Udo Waltz report how they cope with diabetes in everyday life.
Health education and information are important
Diabetes mellitus is one of the most common diseases in the German population with approximately six million patients currently being treated. The number of undiagnosed cases or of individuals with high risk for this metabolic disease is suspected to be equally high. “It is alarming that in Germany each year around 270,000 new cases of type 2 diabetes occur, and the trend is increasing,” said Professor Hrabĕ de Angelis of Helmholtz Zentrum München, who is also a board member of the DZD. “We would like to contribute to informing the public about the current state of knowledge of diabetes research, as well as the causes of diabetes.”
German Center for Diabetes Research
The DZD was founded in 2009 as the second German Center for Health Research. Basic researchers and clinicians work closely together to more rapidly utilize the research findings gained in the laboratory and translate these to clinical practice. Using cutting-edge biomedical technologies, large-scale studies, new methods and research approaches, the DZD seeks to contribute to the elucidation of diabetes pathogenesis and to develop effective and personalized preventive measures and individualized causal therapies. The partners of the DZD are Helmholtz Zentrum München – German Research Center for Environmental Health, the German Diabetes Center in Düsseldorf, the German Institute of Human Nutrition in Potsdam-Rehbrücke and the Paul Langerhans Institutes of the University of Tübingen and the University of Dresden.