Making Ramadan Fasting Safer Among Diabetic Patients.

Overview

Ramadan Fasting is one of the pillars of Islam and about 110 million Muslims with Diabetes mellitus are expected to fast in the month of Ramadan. Despite the well-established benefits of intermittent fasting such as Ramadan fasting, studies have shown that there is an increased rate of complications such as hypoglycaemia, hyperglycaemia, DKA and dehydration among people with diabetes during Ramadan fasting. However, the good news is that these risks can be reduced to the barest minimum or eliminated entirely with good education, risk stratification as shown in the recently released guidelines by the American Diabetes Association (ADA) and International Diabetes Federation and Diabetes and Ramadan Coalition(IDF/DAR).