Bendigo woman honoured with Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) for diabetes advocacy

She was diagnosed with diabetes in 1963 after the birth of her son and has dedicated her life since to helping others with the disease.

She still recalls the day she was diagnosed, August 10 1963.

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"The day I was diagnosed, I went to the doctors and we had a pretty good idea because both my husband and I were nurses," she said.

"He'd taken a urine specimen to work, tested it and it came back brick red and that meant that I had so much sugar it wasn't funny."

"And so I knew that that was what the doctor was going to say and yes, I had diabetes."

The doctor wanted to admit her to hospital immediately but she said she couldn't miss her birthday on August 7.

"I said tomorrow is my birthday and my mother always makes me a pavlova for my birthday so I've got to have a piece of my pavlova," she said.

"He said, 'you certainly can't have that when you go in the hospital so we'll put you in on August 10'.

"So I had my birthday and I had my piece of pav, and then on August 10 I went into hospital and that was the date I was officially diagnosed."

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Ms Kearin explained that she had gestational diabetes when she was pregnant with her daughter in England in 1959 but it disappeared when she was born.

She was kept on a fairly strict diet and that seemed to keep it in check.

She was fine during her pregnancy with her son but then developed type one diabetes when he was around 15 months old.

"That started me off thinking I'd like to do something so I contacted Diabetes Victoria," she said.

She met monthly with the first diabetes nurse educator in the country and around 1967 they discussed having a local group in Bendigo.

The board was supportive and a group travelled up including the celebrated endocrinologist Dr Hal Breidahl who was very supportive of the group.

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There was a meeting in the Baptist Church and up to 400 people packed into the hall to hear about the group.

Ms Kearin thus became a founding member of the Bendigo branch of Diabetes Victoria in 1968, the first group in regional Australia and outside of a capital city, making Bendigo a high-performer when it came to diabetes education.

Ms Kearin's volunteering has also included 18 years on the board coordinating all the diabetes groups around Victoria including in Bairnsdale, Wangaratta, Mildura and Warrnambool.

She continues her work as an advisor on the Diabetes Australia Victoria program and services committee through which she advocates for patients.

She also meets monthly with diabetes staff at Bendigo Health as a representative for patients.

"So if I hear of something that's not quite right with one of the patients that has been admitted and they weren't quite happy or if they've been very happy, I let them know," she said.

In 1999 she studied at Deakin University for a graduate certificate in diabetes education and has taught countless community groups and schools about the disease over the years.

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Not far away from her 60th Kellion medal which she is due to receive in August, signifying that she has lived with diabetes for 60 years, she has been instrumental in changing the lives of those with the disease for more than half a century.

"Over the last few years, we've had people 70 and 75 years receive their medals," she said.

"One woman was only a baby in England when she got diabetes and she got it during the Second World War.

"Her father was a chemist and he had to make the insulin because they couldn't get it then."

Managing the disease has changed dramatically in the years since.

Ms Kearin initially had glass syringes she had to boil and only had one long-acting injection a day whereas she now has four.

Measuring blood sugar progressed from urine tests to finger pricking to arm sensors that indicate someone's blood sugar.

What patients could eat was also much stricter and Ms Kearin still has her scales in the cupboard from when she had to weigh all her food into portions.

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"You had to know what foods needed the portions and what foods were 'free' as we called them and that meant that you could have quite a bit as long as you didn't absolutely go silly," she said.

"It's one of those things, we've got it and we've got to put up with it, but I've never hidden it.

"Especially when I've spoken to schools I say to the kids you really have to tell your best friend or a couple of friends so that they're aware, in case they have a hypo (low blood sugar level, also called hypoglycaemia) in school."

"All you have to do is give them a spoonful of sugar or a bit of lemonade or you know something that's sweet and within five minutes, probably even maybe a bit less, they'll be fine."

Ms Kearin said police have previously picked people up who were experiencing such an attack, thinking they were drunk.

For this reason, in her many education sessions, she recommends people carry around something like jelly beans as well as a card indicating the diabetes diagnosis for others.

While still a life-threatening disease, the odds of survival with type one diabetes are far better than they were historically.

Before the discovery of insulin in 1921, it typically proved fatal within years of diagnosis but now thanks to the evolution of medicine and the work of dedicated individuals like Ms Kearin, life for those with diabetes has improved massively.

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