RIYADH — One of the world's leading diabetes treatment centers signed an agreement with two of Saudi Arabia's diabetic associations that will see diabetes treatment in the Kingdom benefit from increased training, scientific cooperation and knowledge exchange. The agreement was signed recently between the Harvard-affiliated Joslin Diabetes Center, the Saudi Society of Endocrinology and Metabolism (SSEM) and the Saudi Diabetes & Endocrine Association (SDEA), and focuses on the Joslin Center's model for diabetic care, which is credited with reducing treatment costs by a third. “The first step of this program is send more than 40 medics to the US to get acquainted with the model and trained on it,” said SDEA president Dr. Kamel Salama. Salama said specialists from the Joslin Center would also be invited to provided training to around 1,500 health educators and relevant medical staff. Dr. Mohamed Arafa, the Saudi general manager for pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca, which sponsors the Joslin Center, said after the training stage the program would be trialed across a number of regions in the Kingdom to see if it improved outcomes for Saudi diabetic patients.
