Facts & figures
- 1.2 million Australian adults had diabetes in 2017
- Every five minutes an Australian develops diabetes
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Donate to diabetes research
Help us prevent and find a cure for diabetes
We're making strides in the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of type 1, type 2 and gestational diabetes. Your donation will make a difference to the lives of over a million Australians who are diagnosed with diabetes.
Why support our diabetes research?
One of our greatest healthcare challenges, diabetes is a serious chronic disease which causes a myriad of other health problems including:
- blindness
- organ damage or failure
- amputations
- mental illness
- cardiovascular disease.
That's why we are committed to easing the burden of this chronic disease on Australian communities, and have prioritised diabetes as an area of research.
For example:
- the Charles Perkins Centre fosters collaboration between leading experts from a range of disciplines to explore the interconnectedness of our environment, food and health
- the Faculty of Medicine and Health focuses on diabetes as a priority research theme.
With the help of our donor community, we can continue to improve the lives of those diagnosed with diabetes, and work towards prevention and a cure.
Research highlights
We focus on research that can be directly translated into clinical and community practice. We're uniquely positioned to do so, as the home to ten clinical schools (based in hospitals throughout NSW).
Monitoring blood levels with the prick of a finger could be replaced with just a breath test in a matter of years, thanks to a ketone monitoring device that will soon be taken from the lab to the clinic for trials.
The device measures blood ketone levels in the breath to detect and prevent incidences of ketoacidosis, a life-threatening event that occurs when the body does not cause enough insulin, causing the liver to produce high levels of ketones that damage the surrounding organs.
Diabetes is the leading cause of preventable blindness in Australia. Now, a new study is investigating whether blindness in diabetes patients can be reversed. The trial, undertaken by the NHMRC Clinical Trials Centre, is testing whether the cholesterol-lowering drug, fenofibrate, could protect retinal tissue, slowing and even reversing early damage to the eye.
By tracking changes in the back of the eye through non-invasive imaging, they can test how well the drug is working.
Researchers from the University of Sydney and the Capital Markets Cooperative Research Centre (CMCRC) believe that previously-untapped medical records could be used to predict when a person is at risk of developing type 2 diabetes.
The team found that, over time, the prevalence of comorbidities in the group of diabetic patients was almost double that of the non-diabetic patients, indicating entirely different ways of disease progression. They hope the network can help healthcare providers to proactively identify patients at high risk of developing chronic disease.
How to donate
When you make a donation to the University, you can choose to support diabetes research:
- If you'd like to give online, you can make a donation to our research.
- Otherwise, you can leave a bequest in your will, make a one-off or regular donation, or donate in honour or memory of someone.
- Contact us and we can work with you to find the best fit for your donation – whether that's supporting diabetes research more broadly, or directing your donation to a specific area of your choice (eg, preventative education about type 2 diabetes).