Does diabetes qualify?
PIP has no list of qualifying conditions, and no diagnosis qualifies automatically. The legal test is how your condition affects you across 12 activities, on most days, and whether you can do each one safely, to an acceptable standard, repeatedly, and in a reasonable time. For diabetes the claim usually rests on two things: the help you need to manage insulin or other medication and to monitor your glucose, and what hypoglycaemia and complications do to ordinary tasks.
For type 1 diabetes, NICE guideline NG17, Type 1 diabetes in adults: diagnosis and management, is the care-standard anchor. It recognises impaired awareness of hypoglycaemia as a named clinical entity, and it covers intensive insulin self-management and continuous glucose monitoring. For type 2 diabetes, NICE guideline NG28, Type 2 diabetes in adults: management, is the anchor: it also uses impaired hypoglycaemia awareness as a criterion within its glucose monitoring recommendations, and it covers escalation to insulin and surveillance for complications. Cite whichever applies to your own type rather than both.
On the DWP's own figures, DWP Stat-Xplore, PIP caseload April 2026 and decisions May 2025 to April 2026 (16 June 2026 release) records 13,678 claimants with type 1 diabetes (insulin dependent) at a 12-month award rate of 26.0%, 16,335 claimants with type 2 diabetes (non insulin dependent) at 34.5%, and 14,052 claimants recorded under category unknown at 33.7%. All three sit well below the 39.6% rate across all conditions. That gap is worth understanding before you write anything: the condition with one of the heaviest daily self-management burdens has among the lowest award rates, because "well-managed" is repeatedly misread as "not disabled". The management is the disability workload, and the form has to say so in descriptor language.
If you want the descriptor mapping done for you, our medical evidence guide shows what to attach and how to phrase it.
Which descriptors apply
Name the descriptor, then name the reliability limb that fails and how often. Adapt these to your own recent facts, and do not describe difficulties you do not have.
- Daily Living 3, managing therapy or monitoring a health condition. Carb counting, glucose monitoring, injection or pump management and hypo treatment all belong here. Schedule 1 does not count taking medication or monitoring a health condition as "therapy", so where another person has to prompt, supervise or assist you with insulin or with monitoring, for example because of impaired awareness of hypoglycaemia or nocturnal hypos, that is descriptor 3b (1 point). The hours-a-week descriptors 3c to 3f are for therapy, not for insulin or monitoring. Describe the help you actually get, and how many times a week it happens.
- The safety limb, across several activities. Impaired awareness of hypoglycaemia can make cooking and bathing unsafe without someone else present. A documented severe hypo that needed third-party assistance is direct evidence for that limb, so attach the record rather than describing it from memory.
- Daily Living 1, preparing food. Hypo risk arising mid-task, and peripheral neuropathy affecting grip and the ability to feel a hot surface.
- Mobility 2, moving around. Pain from peripheral neuropathy, and foot ulceration or amputation history where that applies to you.
- Daily Living 8, reading and understanding signs and symbols. Retinopathy where it is present and recorded in your screening results.
- Fatigue and glycaemic swings. These usually land on the repeatedly limb in Regulation 4: the task done once in the morning is not the same as the task done again later the same day.
Example answers you could adapt
These are illustrations, written to show the kind of detail that helps a decision maker understand your day: what happens, how often, how long it takes, whether it is safe, and who helps. Describe your own experience in your own words. Never copy an example, or any part of one, that is not true for you.
Each activity is named as it appears in Schedule 1 to the Social Security (Personal Independence Payment) Regulations 2013, and the descriptor wording is quoted from there.
Example only
Daily living activity 3: Managing therapy or monitoring a health condition
“Overnight my glucose sensor alarms when I start to go low, but I sleep through it about once a week, so my wife wakes me and brings me glucose tablets. Every day I count the carbohydrate in each meal, inject four or five times and act on my readings several more times. Since I lost most of my hypo warning signs, she follows my readings on her phone when I am out and rings me if I am dropping. Twice this year she has had to give me glucose gel because I was too confused to treat myself.”
Why this detail matters: Where 3b includes "supervision, prompting or assistance to be able to monitor a health condition", that is the place for alarms you sleep through, readings someone else watches and hypos you could not treat yourself, alongside the injections and counting you do alone.
Example only
Daily living activity 1: Preparing food
“Numbness in my fingertips means I cannot feel how hot a pan handle is, and I have burned my hand twice without noticing until blisters came up. My glucose also tends to drop while I am cooking, and when it does I get shaky and muddled, and once I walked away and left the gas on. I now only use the hob when my son is home, and on my own I stick to the microwave. Chopping is slow because I cannot feel the knife properly, so he does most of that as well.”
Why this detail matters: Descriptor 1e reads "Needs supervision or assistance to either prepare or cook a simple meal", so the burns you did not feel, the hypos that start partway through a meal and the times you only cook with someone at home are what show whether cooking alone is safe for you.
Example only
Daily living activity 4: Washing and bathing
“Because I cannot feel heat properly in my feet, I scalded one of them in the bath last year without realising, so my wife now runs the water and checks it before I get in. I have also had a hypo in the shower that came on with no warning, and I ended up sitting on the shower floor shouting for her because I could not reach my glucose tablets. I test my glucose before every wash and only wash when someone is in. Afterwards she checks the soles of my feet for cuts, because I cannot see them well or feel them.”
Why this detail matters: With no warning before a hypo the question is safety, and 4c reads "Needs supervision or prompting to be able to wash or bathe", so describe what has happened when you washed alone, such as a scald you did not feel, and who is in the house when you wash now.
Example only
Mobility activity 2: Moving around
“Burning, stabbing pain in both feet starts a few minutes into any walk, and by the time I reach the post box at the end of the next street, about 120 metres, I need to sit down on someone's garden wall. I use a stick because I cannot feel the ground properly, and I have tripped on kerbs I did not know were there. While I had an ulcer under my left foot last spring, the podiatry team told me to keep walking to a minimum, and I barely left the house for three months. Even on a good day my feet throb all evening after that walk.”
Why this detail matters: Descriptor 2b reads "Can stand and then move more than 50 metres but no more than 200 metres, either aided or unaided", so measure how far you get before pain or numbness stops you, name the stick, and say what the rest of the day is like after the walk.
Example only
Daily living activity 8: Reading and understanding signs, symbols and words
“Retinopathy has left patches missing in the centre of my vision, so even with my glasses I need a lit magnifier to read letters, and a single page takes me a long time. I cannot make out the carbohydrate figures on food packets, which I need for my insulin doses, so I mostly buy the same foods and look them up on my phone with the text made very large. I misread the date on a hospital letter last year and missed an eye clinic appointment. Signs in shops and at bus stops are a blur unless I get right up close.”
Why this detail matters: Glasses do not count as an aid here, because 8b reads "Needs to use an aid or appliance, other than spectacles or contact lenses, to be able to read or understand either basic or complex written information", so name the magnifier or phone setting you rely on, what you still cannot read with it, and what has gone wrong, such as a misread appointment.
The reliability test
Regulation 4(2A) of SI 2013/377 says you can only be treated as able to do an activity if you can do it safely, to an acceptable standard, repeatedly, and in a reasonable time. Reliability is judged on your current treatment, which is exactly why the treatment burden counts.
- Safely. Hobs, hot pans and knives with impaired hypo awareness or with reduced sensation in the hands; bathing alone; stairs after a hypo.
- To an acceptable standard. Meals abandoned mid-preparation, a monitoring or dosing routine that only holds together when somebody else keeps track of it.
- Repeatedly. Say what a second attempt later in the day looks like after a hypo or after a night of interrupted sleep.
- In a reasonable time. Where treating a hypo, waiting to recover and then restarting a task pushes it hours later, put that in minutes and hours.
For effects that vary day to day, Regulation 7 is the provision to name: a descriptor applies where it fits on over 50% of days across the 12 month period. Give the number of days out of 7 accurately.
The "well-controlled" dismissal
The wording that costs these claims points is some version of "diabetes is well-controlled, therefore no significant functional restriction".
- Control is the product of constant intervention. A stable result describes the outcome of the work, not the absence of it. Set out the number of monitoring checks, corrections and injections in a normal week.
- Daily Living 3 is where the management belongs. Help to manage medication or to monitor a health condition is descriptor 3b, so the answer to that activity is where the workload has to appear, alongside what hypos do to the other activities.
- Impaired awareness of hypoglycaemia converts routine tasks into supervised ones. It is a named clinical entity in NG17, so if it is recorded in your notes, quote the record and then say which activities you no longer do alone.
Evidence to send
- GP or diabetes clinic letters naming the type of diabetes and the treatment regimen.
- HbA1c history as held in your records.
- Hypoglycaemia awareness status where it is recorded, including a Gold or Clarke score if one is present.
- Continuous glucose monitor or flash monitor data summaries.
- Records of severe hypoglycaemic episodes, including ambulance or emergency department contacts.
- Complication letters: retinopathy screening results, podiatry, renal.
- The current prescription list.
- A partner or family statement covering night hypos and prompting.
You can request your records free under UK GDPR. Our medical evidence guide sets out the wording.
At the assessment
Answer with what a normal day and a normal week actually involve rather than what is possible on a good day, and do not overstate it. If you are asked whether you manage your diabetes yourself, say what the routine is, how often it is interrupted, and who steps in. If you are asked whether you can cook, say what happens when your glucose drops mid-task. Ask for adjustments in advance if you need them: a telephone or paper-based assessment, extra time, breaks, or a companion. Bring your diary and monitor summaries and refer to them.
If you are refused
Ask for a Mandatory Reconsideration within one month of the decision. Name the activity, the descriptor you say applies, and the reliability limb that was not applied to it, and say plainly where the help you need under Daily Living 3 was treated as good control. Attach anything new: clinic letters, monitor summaries, severe hypo records, more diary pages. If the MR does not change the award, appeal to the First-tier Tribunal within one month of the MR outcome. Our complete PIP guide covers both stages.
The four-point rule (scrapped)
You may have read about a four-point rule starting in November 2026. It was removed from the bill in July 2025 and never became law. PIP rules are unchanged while the Timms Review runs (expected to report around autumn 2026). Evidence in descriptor and reliability language remains what decides awards.
Build the evidence pack
Our assessment turns your own account of treatment burden, hypoglycaemia and complications into a formal PIP evidence pack drafted against the 12 activities and the reliability test.
Frequently asked questions
Can you get PIP for type 1 diabetes?
PIP has no list of qualifying conditions, so no diagnosis qualifies automatically. Type 1 diabetes scores where its effects and its management stop you doing the 12 PIP activities safely, to an acceptable standard, repeatedly, or in a reasonable time on most days. Carb counting, glucose monitoring, insulin adjustment and hypo treatment are a daily workload rather than a one-off task, and they belong under Daily Living 3. Schedule 1 does not count taking medication or monitoring a health condition as "therapy", so help with them is descriptor 3b (1 point), and the rest of the claim usually rests on what hypoglycaemia and complications do to the other activities.
Can you get PIP for type 2 diabetes?
Yes, on the same functional test. Type 2 claims often turn on treatment burden where insulin or other injectable therapy has been started, on hypoglycaemia risk where it exists, and on complications such as peripheral neuropathy, retinopathy or renal disease. Describe what the management actually takes each day and what the complications stop you doing.
Does good control mean I will not qualify?
Control is not the test. Regulation 4(2A) asks whether you can do each activity safely, to an acceptable standard, repeatedly and in a reasonable time, and reliability is judged on your current treatment. Daily Living 3 records the help you need to manage medication and to monitor a health condition (descriptor 3b), so a stable HbA1c achieved through constant intervention is a description of workload, not of absence of need.
Do continuous glucose monitors count as aids?
A monitor is part of your monitoring arrangements, so it belongs in the Daily Living 3 answer rather than being a reason to score less. Say what you use, how often you act on it, whether anyone else responds to alarms, and what happens overnight. NICE covers continuous glucose monitoring in NG17 for type 1 diabetes and glucose monitoring in NG28 for type 2.
Can children with diabetes claim?
PIP starts at 16. For a child under 16 the equivalent benefit is Disability Living Allowance, which is assessed on care and mobility needs compared with a child of the same age. Our DLA for children guide covers how those forms are approached and what evidence helps.
Sources
- NICE guideline NG17, Type 1 diabetes in adults: diagnosis and management. Accessed 10 August 2026.
- NICE guideline NG28, Type 2 diabetes in adults: management. Accessed 10 August 2026.
- The Social Security (Personal Independence Payment) Regulations 2013, Regulation 4. Accessed 10 August 2026.
- The Social Security (Personal Independence Payment) Regulations 2013, Regulation 7. Accessed 10 August 2026.
- DWP Stat-Xplore, PIP caseload April 2026 and decisions May 2025 to April 2026 (16 June 2026 release). Our analysis, accessed 10 August 2026.
General information and document drafting, not benefits advice. Finally Seen is not affiliated with DWP or the NHS and does not guarantee any award. Check current guidance at gov.uk before sending.