Insulin’s centennial, major trial results focus of ADA annual meeting
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This year’s American Diabetes Association Scientific Sessions will highlight the centennial of the discovery of insulin, as well as the implications of COVID-19 for diabetes and findings from several large trials.
The ADA’s second all-virtual meeting, taking place Friday through Tuesday, was once again shaped by the global COVID-19 pandemic, which forced organizers last year to halt all in-person plans and quickly pivot to a new meeting format. This year, organizers worked to build on the virtual format by finding more ways for attendees and speakers to interact.
“This is the world’s greatest international meeting on diabetes,” Dana Dabelea, MD, PhD, the Conrad M. Riley Endowed Professor, director of the Lifecourse Epidemiology of Adiposity and Diabetes (LEAD) Center at the University of Colorado School of Public Health, and chair of the ADA meeting planning committee, told Healio. “This year we developed many great sessions, and the benefit of going virtual for the second time is that allows participants to attend sessions on their own time, from wherever they are. In addition, all recorded sessions are available for up to 90 days after the meeting. It would be impossible to see all of this content live during a 5-day meeting.”
Several sessions will address the interplay of diabetes and COVID-19, Dabelea said, including an ADA Diabetes Care symposium on learning to minimize risks for people with diabetes during the pandemic. Speakers also will discuss public health and public trust, pregnancy, obesity, and pediatric issues as they relate to diabetes in the era of COVID-19.
Telehealth and telemedicine, also affected by the pandemic in many ways, are recurring topics in the program. Sessions will explore such issues as remote monitoring, equity and reimbursement in the context of telemedicine.
Organizers noted several other highlights of this year’s meeting:
- Efficacy and Safety of Dapagliflozin in Patients with and without Type 2 Diabetes Hospitalized with COVID-19—Results from the DARE-19 Global Randomized Controlled Trial;
- Results of the Glycemic Reduction Approaches in Diabetes—A Comparative Effectiveness (GRADE) Study;
- Tirzepatide—A Novel Dual GIP/GLP-1RA—Results from the First Phase 3 SURPASS Clinical Trials;
- Update on SCORED and SOLOIST Cardiovascular and Kidney Outcomes Trials.
“People liked what we came up with last year, but of course, everyone misses the real-time interactions,” Dabelea said. “That is one of the lessons learned. People want opportunities for interaction, even in a virtual format. This year, we expanded opportunities for participants to interact with speakers, exhibitors, one another. All sessions include a chat function to facilitate questions and comments. This year, we also have a live video Q&A component to go along with certain sessions.”
The meeting will also feature several sessions framed around issues of social determinants of health in diabetes, Dabelea said.
“There are sessions about food and housing security, the effects of the built environment, structural violence and racism, and health care as a social justice issue,” Dabelea said. “These are important sessions.”
The Endocrine Today and Healio.com staff will provide coverage from ADA 2021 with reports on the sessions, video interviews and much more. For more information on the ADA agenda and registration, visit professional.diabetes.org/scientific-sessions.
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