Diabetes doesn’t affect everyone equally. A person’s ethnic group, where they live, what language they speak and many other factors all affect the care they get, how well they can manage their diabetes, their long-term health, and their chances of getting type 2 diabetes.
We’re determined to involve more people from diverse backgrounds at every stage of research. This helps us focus on funding and supporting research that truly makes a difference for everyone affected by diabetes. Here we break down our ongoing commitments to improve Equity, Diversity and Inclusion in every step of our research. You can also find out more in our strategic 5-year action plan.
Ensure our funding process is inclusive, fair and transparent
We’d like to remove barriers to success for all researchers who apply for our funding.
We’re recruiting more people from diverse backgrounds to be members of our funding committees and panels - groups that make decisions about the research we fund. We’re looking at who applies and who’s successful based on ethnicity, socioeconomic background, gender, and caring responsibilities, and the ways we can help increase the diversity of these groups. We will also develop new guidelines to ensure that all funding applications are assessed with clear criteria around EDI and unconscious biases mitigated.
Fund research that addresses health inequities and is relevant to people with or at risk of diabetes from all backgrounds
We are prioritising research that tackles health inequitites in diabetes. In particular, translational research that can help to change the health system and improve care for people with diabetes. We are also prioritising research in locations with the highest burden of diabetes.
We’ve announced funding calls for proposals which seek to address health inequality. And we’ll embed a focus on health inequitites and addressing diversity in research across all our future funding calls.
We are also supporting our researchers in building connections with community organisations, providing clear guidelines on how they should work with them, and fair compensate their involvement in research projects.
Enable researchers of all backgrounds to work in diabetes
We’re committed to identifying and addressing barriers in accessing Diabetes UK funding. Our goal is to attract more students from underrepresented groups, provide support and mentorship and ultimately retain more researchers from diverse backgrounds in diabetes research.
Since 2024, we've partnered with Windsor Fellowship to launch our Black Leaders in Diabetes funding schemes. These aim to support researchers from Black backgrounds and address their underrepresentation in diabetes research in the UK.
We’ll also continue engaging with other underrepresented groups in diabetes research to better understand barriers to funding and explore ways to address them. We aim to provide more tailored career support to researchers from ethnic minority backgrounds, such as mentoring and access to leadership programmes, through partnerships.
Ensure that diabetes research outcomes are relevant to all affected by diabetes
We’re encouraging Diabetes UK funded researchers, where appropriate, to involve a diverse population of participants in their research. And we want to make sure people from diverse backgrounds are inspired to take part in diabetes research. We’re also carrying out equality impact assessments for all our research events.
Guiding our research through diverse lived experience and collaboration
It is important that our work helps everyone with diabetes, and we're eager to work with a wider range of people. The Diabetes Inclusive Community Engagement group, a subgroup of the Diabetes Research Steering Groups, has put together a survey to explore views on life with diabetes.
The information collected will inform the questions we ask scientists, and help to ensure their work addresses issues important to all communities.
If you’re affected by diabetes and would like to share your experience with us, please fill out the survey here.
The ‘INVISIBLE’ campaign
We worked with eight health charities, two community organisations, and eight people with lived experience to co-produce a film that raises awareness about the importance of diversity in health research. This project is led by Egality, a community engagement agency that exists to improve health equity.
Our collective aim is to increase participation in research among people from diverse ethnic groups ultimately improving health treatments and services for everyone. The film features the brilliant Duke Al Durham, who lives with type 1 diabetes, and uses spoken word to highlight why diversity in research matters.
We’re working with the Association of Medical Research Charities to develop cross-sector guidelines to promote diversity in clinical trials. These guidelines will be shared with all researchers seeking Diabetes UK funding.
