Department of Diabetes, Endocrine and Metabolic Medicine

Contents of medical treatment

Our department declares diabetes and endocrine metabolic diseases as our clinical examination and treatment fields. We positively encourage temporary study at different facilities, such as facilities specialized for thyroid, respiratory, and gastrointestinal diseases etc., within the country. Our full-time physicians are proficient in specialized examinations and they instruct young physicians and encourage obtaining a medical specialist qualification. Currently, we have specialists for gastrointestinal diseases in addition to internal medicine, diabetes, endocrine, and metabolic medicine, and aim to provide advanced comprehensive medical care for general medical diseases.

Fields of specialty

Diabetes (educational hospitalization, nephropathy, neuropathy, arteriosclerosis, diabetic foot pathology, dyslipidemia, hypoglycemia and sleep apnea syndrome), endocrine metabolic disease (thyroid disease, obesity, and pituitary and adrenal disease), and gastrointestinal disease.

For improvement of specialized medical care for diabetes, endocrine and metabolism diseases

The clinical picture of diabetes mellitus is created by a close relationship between impaired insulin secretion and decreased insulin sensitivity. It is important to maintain good blood glucose level control for long periods of time by evaluating the diabetes characteristic in individual patients and selecting an appropriate personalized medical treatment based on the result, to search for complications regularly and handle it appropriately, and not to miss complications of diseases which are not directly related to diabetes such as malignant tumors and others. In order to do that, it is required to appropriately perform regular examinations, and we are considering setting up a special outpatient service to intensively perform examinations in a short time. In addition, all patients who visit our department do not necessarily have good blood glucose level control, and there is a limitation with only outpatient services, therefore we set up and perform 2 to 3 weeks of educational hospitalization for diabetes utilizing a clinical path. Considering the busy contemporary society, we are planning to set up a short-term hospitalization with a clinical path.

In order to smoothly perform long term and continuous clinical treatments for diabetic patients, we prepare a medical chart for diabetes and its total number has reached 3,500.
We hold a class for diabetics every weekday together with other staff such as a dietitian, a pharmacist, and a nurse and guide in- and out- diabetic patients in medical treatment.　
For early diagnosis and evaluation of diabetic complications, we perform neurological function evaluation (including the conduction velocity test and the autonomic nervous function test) and carotid ultrasonography by our own department.
We also perform thyroid ultrasound examination and aspiration biopsy cytodiagnosis that are critical to diagnose thyroid diseases by our own department.

Regarding outpatient service

Our department has the following specialized outpatient services:

1. Diabetes specialized outpatient service: Although indicated service hours are only 4 times a week, medical examination for diabetes is actually available in any examination room. Currently, the number of diabetic patients who regularly visit our department is about 2,000. In addition, we set up a special examination for diabetic neuropathy on Thursday.
2. Thyroid gland specialized outpatient service: Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday when thyroid gland ultrasound examination is performed.
3. Obesity specialized outpatient service: Wednesday
4. Lipid metabolism specialized outpatient service: Tuesday afternoon
5. Adrenal gland disease specialized outpatient service: Tuesday afternoon
6. Pituitary disease specialized outpatient service: Thursday afternoon
7. Bone and calcium metabolism specialized outpatient service: Thursday afternoon

The total annual number of outpatients is about 18,000 in recent years.

Regarding inpatient medical treatment

Our department treats inpatients with diabetes and other various diseases. These patients have treatment in our department as much as possible, even when they have complications of diabetes such as malignant tumor, brain, or cardiovascular disorder. We are also often requested to manage blood glucose in patients who are admitted in other medical departments for surgical operation etc., and we always treat 20 to 30 patients in cooperation with other medical departments.

The total annual number of inpatients is about 10,000 for 34 beds in recent years.

Transition of the number of examinations and treatment by our department’s physicians

The total annual number of examinations and treatment by our department’s physicians is as follows:

Abdominal echo (514 cases), thyroid gland echo (840 cases), carotid artery echo (343 cases), neurological function evaluation (57 cases), upper endoscopy (345 cases), colonoscopy (203 cases), and 24-hour continuous blood glucose monitoring (58 cases).

Departments

pagetop