Joined the programme in 2018
Koriyama City in Fukushima Prefecture aims to be "the healthiest city in Japan”. In Koriyama, where Novo Nordisk's only production site in Japan is located, the company launched the first CCD project in Japan with Fukushima Medical University based on this philosophy.
In Koriyama City, the prevalence of diabetes has been increasing year by year for people living with lifestyle-related diseases insured by the National Health Insurance. For example, more than 50% of dialysis patients are complicated by diabetes.
Several reports suggest that diabetes treatment interruption is significantly correlated with the development and severe complications. Studies have examined the factors that cause interruptions but point out that these may differ depending on the characteristics of the people targeted, the medical environment in the region, and their living environment.
Key facts
>50%
of dialysis patients are complicated by diabetes.
The CCD partnership set out to conduct an analysis to determine the living environment and social and cultural factors unique to Koriyama City and to investigate why many people with diabetes struggle to adhere to the medical treatment plan they are advised to follow.
The results of the study
The work included an interview survey, questionnaire survey, and database analysis to understand the characteristics of the 15 districts of the city, as well as to explore the factors that influence the discontinuation of diabetes treatment.
According to the results of the interview survey, people who discontinue diabetes treatment tend to think that diabetes treatment causes financial burdens and restrictions in their lives. On the other hand, those who were able to continue diabetes treatment were able to envision a specific situation in which diabetes could be fatal, understood the importance of health and improved their awareness of health care as a result of diabetes, and were concerned about the burden on caregivers, family members, and others.
In the questionnaire survey, a significant number of those who discontinued treatment lacked a proper understanding of diabetes and were unable to freely decide how to spend their time. Since many people with diabetes who continue treatment have family members with diabetes, it is possible that they are more likely to continue treatment because they are more familiar with the need for treatment and can see it more concretely. The percentage of people with diabetes who were aware of their own diabetes was only about 60%, suggesting the need for patient education.
In addition, the database analysis calculated the number of patients in the 15 districts of the city and the percentage of those who discontinued treatment, and these results will be used as a reference for interventions by public health nurses in each district.
Future Efforts in Koriyama City
Koriyama City will disseminate the results of this joint research to citizens and share the information with medical, health, and other related organisations so that they can make use of it in their respective activities.
Moving forward, the Cities Changing Diabetes partners will consider action plans to increase awareness about diabetes and knowledge about how to manage the disease.
"Koriyama City has been selected as an SDG Future City. We believe this project is essential to that goal."
— Masato Shinagawa, the Mayor of
Koriyama city
"There was some confusion among those involved at the beginning of the project because of the industry-academia-government collaboration, but we overcame this and were able to produce results. We believe that we have created something that can be presented as a model for collaboration between industry, government, and academia."
— Tetsuhito Fukushima, professor of the Department of Hygiene and Preventive Medicine, School of Medicine of Fukushima Medical University
