TO MOST people, a one-percentage point reduction in anything may not seem like much.

But to the diabetic patients on a nationwide programme to help them control their disease, that one-point drop cuts their risk of death from diabetes by 21 per cent, a heart attack by 14 per cent, and kidney disease and blindness by 37 per cent.

Launched last August by public health group SingHealth, the programme has helped reduce the blood sugar level of 103 diabetics from an average of 8.1 per cent to 7.2 per cent.

A blood glucose level of 7 per cent is the benchmark for well-controlled diabetes, said Dr Daphne Khoo, SingHealth's director of quality management who oversees the programme.

"It's a very good improvement," she said yesterday, during a press conference about the programme's positive first-year results. "It's very important to patients."

The patients, who were recommended for the programme by their family doctors, achieved those results after just four to six months and were able to do so because of better monitoring from their own doctors and education.

Delivering On Target (DOT) is a community-based programme aimed at helping general practitioners (GPs) improve care of their patients with chronic diseases.

Doctors who enrol in it get four tutorials from SingHealth specialists on topics such as behaviour modification.

Also chipping in to help are nurse educators from the Diabetic Society of Singapore, who give patients three free counselling sessions - which usually cost $10 - on how to manage their condition.

One participating doctor, Dr Michael Koh, said: "The time we spend with the patient may be up to half an hour, but there's only so much the GP can do."

Each GP enrols five diabetic patients, who usually also have high blood pressure or cholesterol level.

The agreement is for the doctors to stick to the treatment programme developed by SingHealth.

There are 63 GPs and 242 patients on the programme. The 103 whose results were analysed have been on it for at least four months.

Patients' average cholesterol levels also dropped slightly, though blood pressure remained unchanged and some patients gained weight.

DOT is part of a concerted national strategy to transfer the management of chronic diseases to the community and patients themselves, as such schemes often show better results.

Mr Mohhamad Salleh Rahman has seen his blood sugar level drop from 8.3 per cent in November to 6.1 per cent now.

The 41-year-old aircraft technician said: "A lot of people tell you that you can't do this or that, and you don't know if they are correct. It's good to talk to a nurse, an expert with the right knowledge."

Another 30 GPs will join the programme next month. Next year, SingHealth will roll out further initiatives such as community screening, a patient self-management programme and an online portal to link hospitals, GPs and patients.

In the future, it will also be transferring stable patients to GPs. About one in four patients now seen by hospital specialists can actually be treated by GPs, Dr Khoo estimated.