"This is positive preventative public health training!"

Routine Blood sample suggested I was pre-diabetic. GP suggested she book me on the 'Walking away from Diabetes' course. She didn't sound too enthusiastic, but I thought it was worth seeing what was on offer.

I did the course in early December 2014. It took about five hours and was very informative, and well run by two skilled professionals. Lots of exercises (paper ones not physical! ) and questioned what we all knew about diabetes, it's causes and prevention. It took our knowledge forward in a well structured manner.

Now with this type of training it would be easy to do it and find a few weeks later, nothing has really changed and your lifestyle hasn't changed much if at all, and you would be at the same level of risk of developing diabetes as you were before attending the course. But they have a secret weapon...the PEDOMETER! It comes free with course paperwork and lets you measure how many steps you are doing (or in my case was not doing) each day by just having it clipped to your belt. For me, this has been a major motivator to keep exercising every day, With a few minor dietary changes (less wine and 90% less butter "boo hoo") I've lost weight and have a lot more energy. The main problem is finding the time to do the right amount of walking or other exercise, but that's a matter of organising my day better. I really do notice it if I miss a day without my walk.

The key thing is the pedometer along with the log book to keep a record of what I've done. It really motivates me to keep doing the daily walks...what a brilliant idea, whoever developed the course and thought up issuing the pedometer know about motivation.

This is positive Public Health preventative training in action...nice one!