Incidence and prevalence | Right Decisions

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Type 2 diabetes mellitus: Quality prescribing strategy - a guide for improvement
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Incidence and prevalence

Please update your RDS mobile app to version 4.7.1

We are pleased to advise that deep linking capability, enabling users to directly download individual mobile toolkits, has now been released on the RDS mobile app. When you install the update, you will see that each toolkit has a small QR code icon the header area beside the search icon – see screenshot below. Clicking on this icon will open up a window with a full-size QR code and the alternative of a short URL for sharing with users. Instructions are provided.

You may need to actively install the update to install RDS app version 4.7.1 to see this improvement. Installing this update is also strongly recommended to get the full benefits of the new contingency arrangements – specifically, that if the RDS website should fail, you will still be able to download new mobile app toolkits.

To check your current RDS version, click on the three dots bottom right of the RDS app screen. This takes you to a “More” page where you will see the version number. To install latest updates:

On iPhones – go to the Apple store, click on your profile icon top right, scroll down to see the apps waiting to be updated and update the RDS app.

On Android phones – these can vary, but try going to the Google Play store, click on your profile icon top right, click on “Manage apps and device”, select and update the RDS app.

Please get in touch with ann.wales3@nhs.scot with any questions.

At the end of 2020 there were 327,927 people with known diabetes in Scotland recorded on Scottish Care Information-Diabetes (SCI-Diabetes), which represents a crude prevalence of 6.0% of the population of all ages (5,463,300). The full report is available here¹⁰

Diabetes prevalence over time

The increase in reported prevalence is influenced by numerous factors, including:

Demographic change - diabetes is more prevalent in older age groups, so increasing numbers of older people each year will increase the prevalence of diabetes.
Improved survival – related to improvements in treatment and care of all medical conditions.
Earlier diagnosis, including those in younger age groups.
Rising obesity levels - having a body mass index (BMI) in the overweight or obese range (BMI >25 and >30 respectively) is the most significant modifiable risk factor for developing T2DM.