….and the answer is, who is Dana Ball.
It is not enough just to say that Dana serves as the Chief Executive Officer of the T1D Exchange. The T1D Exchange was designed to connect the disparate stakeholders in the type 1 diabetes community — individuals with type 1 diabetes, caregivers, clinicians, researchers and industry partners — by combining the critical components of a traditional clinical research with the expanding fields of health information technology and social networking.
It took much more than the creation of the T1D Exchange, someone needed to build it and teach others how to utilize the enormous reach of the database. Dana built the T1D Exchange and “Glu” into a multi level information center that can be utilized by a great deal of those looking to connect this wide diabetes community. He took the necessary steps to teach others how this incredible collection of individuals with Type-1 could be connected with each other, accessed properly, and at the same time keeping the database of individuals protected and utilized correctly. Not an easy task by any means. Not only did Dana accomplish this, he did it right by adding the correct individuals on his team to make the effort hugely successful.
His Bio from the last 10 years positions him as an innovator, creator, and chief ‘advancer’ in our diabetes world.
From his Bio:
Dana Ball is the CEO and co-founder of T1D Exchange. He has been driving innovative diabetes initiatives for over 10 years. Most recently, Ball was program director for the Helmsley Type 1 Diabetes Program at the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust. While there, he co-founded the T1D Exchange, which is a nonprofit research organization whose mission is to improve quality of life for people with type 1 diabetes. Prior to joining the Helmsley Charitable Trust, Ball served as executive director at the Iacocca Foundation, where he oversaw all aspects of the family’s charities and led a multimillion dollar public campaign to advance the emerging field of beta cell regeneration. Ball has been a patient advocate since the early 1980s, with broad advocacy experience in a wide range of serious diseases, including type 1 diabetes and HIV/AIDS. Ball received his degree in business administration from the University of Southern Maine.
For Diabetes Awareness Month:
This month, I will be highlighting someone in the diabetes community. They may be people you know, or might not know, but they give of themselves to make this world, our world, with diabetes a special place. I will not get to everyone this month, but it is my hope that perhaps you can be introduced to some of those you may not know.
I’m certainly not the definitive on who should be included….you are. If you think I should include someone, shoot me an email at tkarlya@drif.org and I will do what I can to include that person as well. Welcome to diabetes awareness month.
I am a diabetes dad.
Please visit my Diabetes Dad FB Page and hit ‘like’.