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Juvenile Diabetes

For many years, Type 1 Diabetes has been referred to as Juvenile Diabetes. Most often, the people who are diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes are children and young adults. Insulin is a natural hormone found in your body that helps the body to convert sugar, starches, and other foods into the energy that is needed to sustain life. People are diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes when their body fails to produce enough insulin to properly convert the intake of sugars and starches into energy.

Type 1 Diabetes is an autoimmune disease – a disease that results in the body’s failure to fight infections naturally. Autoimmune diseases cause the body to begin attacking its own cells. In Type 1 Diabetes, the cells that are attacked are the beta cells in the pancreas that produce the insulin that turns sugars and starches into the energy needed for your body to function properly.

Cause and Length of Illness

Though the cause of Type 1 Diabetes is unclear, there are several things that we do know about this disease. Type 1 Diabetes is a lifelong, yet often manageable disease. Lifestyle and genetics play a large role in the onset and diagnosis of Type 1 Diabetes. It is not contagious like a cold; therefore Type 1 Diabetes cannot be passed from one person to another. Diabetes is not caused from eating sweets. One symptom of diabetes is that the body fails to produce the hormone that turns sugars and starches into energy – but consuming sugars and starches do not cause the disease.

What To Do if You Are Diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes

If you are diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes, the first thing that you should do is to avoid panicking. Type 1 Diabetes is a serious and lifelong illness, though in many cases it can be successfully managed with the proper care and diet. Maintaining your overall health is the first step to successfully managing diabetes.

Type 1 Diabetes can sometimes lead to other, more serious health conditions – such as heart attack and stroke. While maintaining a healthy lifestyle may not prevent the onset of these other illnesses, it may increase the onset of the illnesses and can help to lessen the effects of these illnesses dramatically. Skin disorders can also be caused by diabetes; therefore, it is important to maintain a routine regimen of skin care that may help to delay or even avoid the onset of skin diseases associated with diabetes.

Type 1 Diabetes could place you at a higher risk for contracting gum diseases and other mouth-related problems. It is important to maintain a proper oral hygiene regimen in order to reduce the risks of illnesses associated with the mouth. Proper eye care and early detection of problems can contribute to saving your sight. Blindness is often associated with diabetes. Nerve damage or poor blood flow associated with Type 1 Diabetes can cause a diabetic to develop many different types of foot problems. It is important that you follow some basic guidelines that will help you protect your feet and avoid the onset of foot-related problems.

Lifestyle choices can help or hinder your management of Type 1 Diabetes. It is very important that you maintain a healthy lifestyle, complete with a healthy diet, regular exercise, and proper hygiene. In that fashion, there are some things that you should completely avoid or limit.

Smoking is a habit that contributes to the deterioration of your health, especially if you have been diagnosed with a disease that already affects your health, such as Type 1 Diabetes. Smoking is definitely something that should be avoided – and is a good idea even if you have not been diagnosed with diabetes.

While alcohol consumption should be limited, it is not completely necessary to avoid all consumption of alcohol. If your diabetes is under control and if you are free of any of the health problems associated with diabetes that can be made worse by alcohol consumption, such as nerve damage or high blood pressure, it is often okay to have the occasional social drink. Stress is also something that can contribute to increasing the affects of Type 1 Diabetes. While stress cannot always be avoided, it is essential to both your physical and your mental health to learn how to handle stress in a healthy manner.

Millions of people around the world are inflicted by diabetes mellitus, or more commonly called diabetes. You may be suffering from this chronic disease without even knowing you have it. Even though it an incurable disease, you can lead a long, normal healthy life if the diabetes is properly controlled by following the proper treatment method.

Causes Of Diabetes

Diabetes is the result of failure of your pancreas to produce insulin. Insulin is necessary to help glucose enter into the cells of your body where it is used to release energy. When insulin is not available or is not functioning like what it’s supposed to be, glucose will not be able to penetrate into the cells. It will remain in your blood and when the blood glucose level is too high it will result in a condition called pre-diabetes or diabetes. A pre-diabetes condition is a situation where the blood glucose level is higher than normal, but below the level where it would be classified as diabetes. If both this condition is left untreated, it will lead to other health problems such as renal failure, blindness, heart disease and even liver failure. Persons diagnosed with a diabetes condition should get immediate medical attention to avoid further complications because diabetes can be managed quite easily by the patient himself.

Diabetes can be generally classified into 3 categories, i.e. Type 1 Diabetes, Type 2 Diabetes and Gestational Diabetes. Type 1 diabetes is generally suffered by children or young adults. The most common form of diabetes is Type 2 diabetes which is experience by most adults and older people. Gestation diabetes is when a pregnant woman experiences a high blood glucose level although prior to her pregnancy, she does not have this condition. This condition may also disappear after she delivers her child.

Is Diabetes An Inherited Disease?

The answer is not too clear. Statistics have shown that 10 percent of children suffering from Type 1 diabetes have a close relative with this type of disease. Scientist and medical researchers have recently identified that when a muted gene (SUMO-4) is present, the risk of getting Type 1 diabetes in children increases. However for Type 2 diabetes, the role of genetics is unclear.

Symptoms of Diabetes

Most people do not know they are suffering from diabetes because the symptoms can be quite obscure without actually screening for the disease. Some of the symptoms of diabetes include the following:

* frequent urination especially at night
* feeling thirsty and hungry frequently
* blurred vision
* loosing weight without trying
* feeling tired or fatigue easily
* bruises and cuts which are difficult to heal
* numbness or tingling sensation in your hands and feet
* gum, skin or bladder infection that keeps coming back

Some of these symptoms are too obscure and leads to delayed diagnosis of diabetes. Some patients do not even show these symptoms. When in doubt, consult your family doctor and have the screening process for diabetes done.

Conclusion

Diabetes is a serious disease that affects many people. More than 6 million Americans do not know they are suffering from Type 2 diabetes. As a precaution, persons above the age of 45 should undergo screening for diabetes, especially if you are overweight. If it is confirmed that you have diabetes, do not feel as if your life is ending soon. Get medical attention fast and you will lead a long normal life.

Adult Onset Diabetes

Type 2 Diabetes is often referred to as adult onset diabetes for the simple reason that most Type 2 Diabetes diagnoses occur in the adult years. Unlike Type 1 Diabetes, Type 2 Diabetes is not an autoimmune disease. Rather than destroying the cells that produce insulin, in Type 2 Diabetes, the body shows a resistance to this insulin and the cells ignore the insulin that is produced.

Risk Factors

Like Type 1 Diabetes, there is no known cause for Type 2 Diabetes and there is no known cure. Type 2 Diabetes is a chronic condition, which means that it is a long-term disease that cannot be cured, but that can be managed. Once you are diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes, it is important that you begin a plan to successfully manage the symptoms of the disease as quickly as possible in order to avoid or delay other complications and illnesses that can derive from untreated diabetes.

Type 2 Diabetes can in people of all ages, races, and economic backgrounds. However, there are some groups that are at higher risk for Type 2 Diabetes, such as African Americans, Native Americans, Asian Americans, and Latinos.

Obesity is one of the many factors that can contribute to the onset of Type 2 Diabetes. While obesity does not cause the disease, the presence of more fatty tissue can cause the cells to become more resistant to the insulin that your body naturally produces.

Inactivity can also make the risk of contracting Type 2 Diabetes higher. Exercise and physical activity helps you to control your weight as well as uses up glucose as energy, which helps to make your cells more sensitive to insulin.

Family history and age can also play an important role in the risk of developing Type 2 Diabetes. The risk of Type 2 Diabetes increases if you have a parent or sibling who has been diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes. The risk also increases as you age, simply because people tend to get less exercise, lose muscle mass, and gain weight all of which contribute to the cells becoming more resistant to the insulin that your body produces.

Can Type 2 Diabetes Be Prevented?

There are many contributing factors to Type 2 Diabetes. Even if diabetes runs in your family, there are certain lifestyle choices that can help to reduce your risk of Type 2 Diabetes or to help reduce the risk of other complication and illnesses that can be a result of Type 2 Diabetes.

One of the most important prevention tools is a healthy diet. A healthy diet consists of foods that are low in fat and calories and includes a variety of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. Sweets do not have to be totally avoided, however should be consumed in small quantities and should be a part of a diet including plenty of fruits and vegetables.

Regular exercise is also an important prevention tool. Since obesity is one of the most common risk factors for Type 2 Diabetes, a regular exercise routine combined with a healthy diet not only reduces your risk of obesity and the onset of Type 2 Diabetes symptoms, it also reduces your risk of other illnesses and diseases. Regular exercise also helps to maintain good muscle tone and good blood flow, both of which help your body to function properly and aid in the prevention and recovery of many illnesses and diseases.

While Type 2 Diabetes is a serious and long-term illness, and can result in life-threatening complications, a diagnosis of Type 2 Diabetes does not have to be a death sentence. Proper education and management of the disease can increase your chance of living a long healthy life and it starts with maintaining a healthy lifestyle as early in life as possible. Type 2 Diabetes is a serious, yet manageable disease. Maintaining a healthy lifestyle is one of the most important things you can do in the prevention and management of Type 2 Diabetes.