Here are some fun travel facts about diabetes: an average Boeing 737 carries nearly 10 passengers who have diabetes. For every five cars on the road, there is one person with diabetes present. Whether you're going on a weekend getaway or a once-in-a-lifetime excursion across Europe, if you have diabetes, careful preparation is an essential component of getting ready for your trip.

Accu-check has put together a free resource guide for people with diabetes to help them travel with ease and confidence. It offers some tips, lists and suggestions to help them prepare for the journey and enjoy the ride, worry-free. The diabetes travel kit includes: a brochure detailing tips like proper handling of test supplies and medications, traveling across time zones, and special circumstances like traveling with an insulin pump. The kit also includes a Doctor's Declaration/medical certificate form that lists the physician's contact information and approves the user to be carrying diabetes supplies (helpful when going through airport security, border crossings and customs). And probably among the most important and least considered - the kit provides a foreign language phrase book, which translates some key phrases for people with diabetes into French, German, Japanese, Russian and Spanish.

Whether your travels take you down the road, or across the globe - knowing that you've covered all bases before you depart will help you keep your mind on your business or your pleasure. Your diabetes is something you can pack for as easily as your weekly attire, thanks to Accu-check for the helping hand!!

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) says a pilot's diabetes may have been a factor in a fatal plane crash in south-west Queensland just over two years ago.

The 49-year-old man was flying to New South Wales in October 2004 when he reported feeling unwell near St George. A short time later, the two-seater Canard plane crashed in a rugged area on the town's outskirts, killing the pilot. The ATSB found the plane was in working order at the time of the incident and the bureau says it is unable to pinpoint what caused the man to become disoriented before the crash. However, it says dehydration and the man's diabetes, which was diagnosed a year earlier, may have contributed to the crash.

This is the kind of news that leaves me wondering what the pilot's blood sugar was at the time of the crash. If it was in range or even considerably high I'm not so sure the cause of the crash was diabetes related. So if the pilot was dehydrated - it is possible his numbers were a little on the high side. If that's the case, I'm skeptical that his diabetes was fairly contributed to the crash. I know I'd rather drive my car with my sugar a little higher than lower. What do you think?