Other people needed support, so I became a peer educator - Zurab Maisuradze
In 2008, when Zurab found out he had diabetes and that other people in his community needed help with managing the same disease, he decided to become a peer educator. At 71, Zurab continues to be a local activist and cherished leader of a self-support group.
In Georgia, there are 1 million people diagnosed with diabetes – 12.4% of the total population. Since 2006, there has been an increase in diabetes prevalence of almost 20%, while the number of Georgians estimated to have pre-diabetes is up to 2 million.
In rural areas, managing diabetes and accessing care is even more difficult and has posed challenges that the projects supported by WDF in Georgia have been tackling in the past decade. One way to make these efforts sustainable was to establish local patient support groups.
In marginalised areas like Ditsi, a village in the Gori district, more than 288,000 people are internally displaced or affected by the protracted conflict at the northern border.
One of them is Zurab Maisuradze, a local farmer who was diagnosed with diabetes in 2008 after going to the doctor for symptoms he believed were due to depression or another post-war psychological disorder.
‘After being diagnosed, I became interested in learning more about diabetes management; at the same time, I found out that other people with diabetes from my community needed support, so I trained as a peer educator as part of the project’, explains Zurab, who trained as a peer educator through a WDF-supported project (WDF12-0720).
Soon after the training, Zurab became the leader of a self-support group that has been active for more than a decade.
‘This initiative helped me and other community members with diabetes to support each other by exchanging information, sharing strips, needles and other materials or medicine when somebody was in great need and unable to purchase it’.
Disease management became easier and quality of life improved as they already knew how to support each other. However, things took a turn for the worse in the following years.
‘I felt tingling and pain in my feet, but I did not pay much attention to it in the beginning, then I soon noticed ulcers on my skin’. Given his experience as a peer educator, Zurab suspected it was related to diabetes and went to the doctor.
The nurse working at the health centre previously received training in podiatry through a WDF-supported project and she was able to successfully manage Zurab’s feet ulcers.
‘I was very satisfied and motivated to manage my disease’ he remembers. Then two years ago, the podiatrist nurse who was taking care of his diabetic foot complications left the country, and Zurab could not access proper treatment anymore.
When his diabetic foot issues reappeared, Zurab found out that he could get treated at the Gormedi clinic.
Since then, Zurab has received treatment from doctors trained in diabetic foot management through various WDF-funded programmes, such as a diabetic foot care improvement project completed in 2017 (WDF14-0923).
