Can medication and religion co-exist: Ramadan and diabetes

Dr Nafisa Khan and Tahmeed Omar | October 2023

In 2021, Percept and the Western Cape Department of Health and Wellness launched a telehealth pilot intervention to support people living with poorly controlled diabetes. The programme was called PRO-Active TElemedicine TaCTical OpeRation (PROTECTOR). 

The aim of the intervention was to see whether a short telehealth-delivered intervention from a doctor could help patients in the Klipfontein and Mitchells Plain region of Cape Town to optimise their diabetes condition and bring their clinical measures (such as HbA1c) within clinically normal ranges.

The programme coincided with the period of Ramadan, a time where healthy Muslim adults are expected to fast from dawn to sunset. There were many Muslim participants in the pilot, and the telehealth doctor administering the intervention was herself a Muslim woman. This ability to understand her patients’ context and religious requirements allowed her to pre-empt some of the challenges faced by Muslims living with diabetes during the holy month of Ramadan.

Read the collaborative piece below.