A Centretown-based diabetes education program has launched a new website to extend its reach into the community.
Launched in September, the website features a wealth of information on diabetes, healthy living, and the services offered by the Community Diabetes Education Program of Ottawa, which is based out of the Centretown Community Health Centre.
Jennifer Stipetic is a nurse with the program, and says the website’s primary goals are to raise diabetes awareness and inform the Centretown community of what services are available to those suffering from the condition.
“It makes us more noticeable,” she says. “Before having our own website, people could only find our program through the Centretown Community Health Centre. This gives us our own profile.”
Program director Betty MacGregor says going electronic offers a range of other benefits too.
“It’s another means of reaching out to different populations,” she says.
Centretown is home to a diverse demographic that includes new Canadians, senior citizens and low-income families, all of whom are at a higher risk of developing diabetes.
This is why having easily accessible information is so important, she said.
Canadian Diabetes Association programs and services co-ordinator Renee Lebovitz Pelletier has worked with the education program in the past.
She says she is proud of what the program has accomplished with the website.
“I think it’s great,” she says. “It has all the information about diabetes you need, and I don’t know of any other sites that have an education program.”
Pelletier says the website is a particularly good way to reach out to the community because it is “user-friendly and easy to navigate.”
The website has been well-received by the community so far.
MacGregor says the demand for services has increased since the creation of the website.
“There has definitely been interest. We have had people emailing and calling us, asking for more information.”
Some of the most interesting features of the website visitors are finding include the individual diabetes-risk calculator and a page where patients and local physicians can be referred to one another.
Though the website is still new, MacGregor already has ideas for expanding it.
“We’d like to have a connection for diabetes patients who have attended our group to do a follow-up,” she says. “We’d like to have online registration too, and ultimately that would make things easier for our staff, and clients who would like to sign up.”