The Gregorio Marañón hospital has conditioned the waiting, consultation and hospital areas to which children with diabetes go to make it more cozy, promote healthy habits and help families understand the disease.
Thanks to a collaboration agreement with Lilly, the hospital has created in its facilities a playful-formative space called Play Zone in which, through games and educational materials, children entertain and relax before their medical or nursing consultation
It highlights in the new space the presence of the first Disney character with diabetes, the coconut monite, which stars the stories "Coco and Goofy on Goofy's birthday" or "Coco returns to school" and already appears in the cartoons on television."The children who go to the hospital and wait for their consultation at the Play Zone will recognize this character from the Mickey gang that practices a magnificent control of their diabetes and teaches minors to assume the normality of their situation," he saidTeresa Millán, Director of Corporate Affairs of Lilly.
These initiatives try to show minors with diabetes that with specific care can be enjoyed a full life is a fundamental action for Play Zone.In this space, children can learn, in a simple, fun way and through the example of coconut, what diabetes consists of and how to minimize the impact that this disease can cause in their day to day.When a minor with diabetes is diagnosed, it is common for the child to have to go to hospital consultations once or twice a week, initially, and every two or three months when the treatment is stabilized.
Monographic consultation
The Pediatric Endocrinology Unit of the Gregorio Marañón University General Hospital, which serves more than 150 children with diabetes mellitus type 1 every year from zero to 16 years, will launch this same month a monographic consultation of diabetes that will be directed by Dr. MaríaSanz and will have the educator Virginia Montero, highly qualified professionals who will offer specialized attention to both children and their families.It is important to highlight this facet of the toilets of the Gregorio Marañón hospital since, in addition to treating the patient, they perform a didactic and preventive work during the pediatric age (childhood and adolescence) to avoid the serious complications that diabetes mellitus can cause when reaching theadulthood.
“These children require periodic controls with consultations that require a high level of knowledge and dedication to optimize their treatment.In these consultations, evaluation of glycemic profiles, transdermal glucose, glucose monitoring, treatments with different types of insulin and continuous insulin infusions in cases that require this option are carried out.In addition, always with education to the child and the family to know how to make changes when they need it.All this is aimed at improving the attention to the child with diabetes and their family and to improve their quality of life avoiding metabolic side effects in the short and long term for their illness, ”said María Dolores Rodríguez Arnao, head of the Pediatric Endocrinology Unit of the Pediatric Endocrinology UnitGregorio Marañón Hospital.This center is the third public hospital of the Community of Madrid in hosting the initiative, with Ramón y Cajal and La Paz.
With the installation of a playful zone such as Play Zone, it is tried to reduce the level of stress that it supposes for these children frequently go to the hospital.The space includes games, tables and chairs for the children to entertain and paint, and reading areas with educational stories such as those starring Coco.The character, whose characterization includes a bracelet with the word "diabetes" and a backpackWith the care kit that the disease requires, it arose thanks to an agreement worldwide reached in 2011 by Lilly and Disney to normalize diabetes and reduce its impact on childhood with a positive message against the disease.