To ask the Minister of Health to detail his plans to (i) extend and improve emotional support and clinical mental health therapy to those living with diabetes; and (ii) improve education in schools about diabetes.

The need for emotional support and clinical mental health therapy for people living with diabetes was highlighted in both the 2017 Diabetes UK “Future of Diabetes” Report and in its 2019 report “Too Often Missing – making emotional and psychological support routine in diabetes care”.

The Diabetes Network supports the implementation of the recommendations of the Diabetes Strategic Framework for Northern Ireland and works in partnership with clinicians, health and social care professionals, Diabetes UK and people living with diabetes on the design and delivery of better diabetes services. This includes ensuring that people living with diabetes have access to the treatment, care, information and support they need to manage their diabetes effectively and to optimise their physical and mental and emotional health and well-being.

The Diabetes Network recognises both the importance of emotional and psychological support for people living with diabetes and also the need for more work in this area. In the short term, Health and Social Care Trusts have been invited to avail of non-recurrent funding up to March 2021 to enhance the current provision of psychological support for people living with diabetes. Funding will be allocated to help Trusts follow guidance and best practice in order to consider ways to support people living with diabetes, including, for example:

joint learning and training opportunities in mental health services for staff across different disciplines;

the use of on-line questionnaires for mental health screening and video conferencing for talking therapies interventions and to inform conversations between diabetes health care professionals and people living with diabetes on their current mental health and coping strategies;

on-line self-help psychological support and psychological education regarding emotional and mental health offered to individuals to help empower them to manage their emotional and mental health;

signposting opportunities to resources such as the Public Health Agency’s “Take 5 Steps to well-being” and “Steps to Deal with Stress” and signposting to the NI Minding your head.info website and mindfulness exercises.

In relation to improving education in schools about diabetes, there is close co-operation between schools and local HSC Trusts to ensure a child who is living with diabetes can participate fully in school activities and that the school has access to the information required to help support the child.

When a child is diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes, the child and their family receive education and information about how to manage their diabetes. The child is then offered a group based programme of structured education (the CHOICE programme) in the first six months following diagnosis.

The school the child attends also receives education, information and advice from the diabetic specialist nurse about how the child’s diabetes should be managed in a school setting. All children with diabetes have an individual healthcare plan that describes the care the child should receive while in school. There is also a communication booklet which enables the parent to advise on the daily doses of insulin required for their child’s dietary requirements. There is a regionally agreed format for the health care plan and communication booklets used in all schools in Northern Ireland.