For the first time ever, the Quality in Care (QIC) Diabetes Awards went virtual. The DSN Forum team won the Diabetes Healthcare Professional of the Year award back in 2018, and after our win we decided to give something back to the community, in the form of judging future awards. Beth was a judge last year and this year it was Amanda’s turn. The sheer amount of entries was astounding considering the year that we have all had.

Not a lot of people will know how the judging process works, so let us tell you a bit about it. Each judge is put into a team, and the team scores all the same categories, each giving our own marks for originality, innovation and more. The judging was done during an all-day Zoom meeting, where we broke out into rooms to discuss our winners. It takes a long time to do the job justice, and all of this is done voluntarily by the judges. It’s so nice to read all the entries and see what fantastic projects have been done across the UK. It’s such high-class work, Amanda wished they could make you all winners! Some amazing projects were seen, including a few from our friend Dr Rose Stewart, who excitingly ended up with a double win on the night! Congratulations Rose!

We were also really pleased to see our friend, honorary DSN Forum team member and quite often tech support, Nick Calm, win the NHS England Outstanding Contribution Award for Services to Diabetes – thoroughly deserved! Well done!

However, the highlight of our evening was when not one but two of our admin team, Tamsin and Vicky, were nominated for Healthcare Professional of the Year. We waited in eager anticipation as all the other results were read out by various celebrities in the diabetes world, and we even caught a glimpse of the TikTok we did to encourage people to enter the Hypo Awareness Week award. And we were so proud when Vicki took the top award! Tamsin and Vicki have only been in the Forum team since the first lockdown; however, they have made so much of an impact on the team – they are both very much Healthcare Professionals of the Year in our eyes.

A review of the night has now been published in this journal.

Hypo Awareness Week

Hypo Awareness Week took place between the 5^th and 11^th October, and this year the theme was TikTok, which, as you know, we are huge fans of! TikTok is a great innovative way to educate and raise awareness about diabetes in the form of short, fun videos. The Forum team did a promotional TikTok to spread the news about the theme and encouraging others to get involved. The week afterwards, the Diabetes 101 team did two successful tweetorials, covering the lowdown on hypos and the science behind them with Professor Pratik Choudhary. They were incredibly well engaged and so many people received vital education on hypoglycaemia as a result.

There were lots of fabulous videos shared within the Forum and across social media during the week, and of course the Hypo Awareness Week Excellence Award was part of the QiC Awards. Well done to Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust for winning the award with their fabulous dancing diabetes team. Their video can be viewed here.

Diabetes Awareness Month

As we look forward to November and the start of Diabetes Awareness Month, and World Diabetes Day on the 14^th, there are lots of exciting things happening. In the upcoming DPC virtual conference, Amanda and Beth are presenting on how to use social media in diabetes nursing, Tamsin is talking about her pump service and how it has changed during the COVID pandemic, and Vicki is presenting about her service, the Liverpool Diabetes Partnership (@LDPartnership), and how the integrated team works across the city of Liverpool. There will also be other sessions from the DSN Forum and many great speakers across the three days.

United Through Diabetes is a new initiative this year and a collaboration between the Diabetes Research and Wellness Foundation (DRWF) and DPC. DRWF has been unable to hold its highly successful regional Diabetes Wellness Days across the country due to the pandemic, so this year it is taking them online. The DSN Forum, amongst other healthcare professionals, will be presenting during the day. It will be held on World Diabetes Day – Saturday 14^th November – from 9.30 am to 5 pm.

Finally, the At the 4-Front: Leadership in diabetes nursing meeting is taking place on 27^th November. This half-day conference for diabetes nurse leaders and those aspiring to become nurse leaders will be taking a deep dive into mental health issues, diabetic kidney disease and, of course, managing diabetes during the pandemic. Interested readers can click here to pre-register.

So that’s us super busy for the next month, as we head into Diabetes awareness month and a second lockdown, we hope you all stay safe and we hope to see you at DPC too!