Understanding Diabetes and Handling Its Emergencies

by M. K. Ansari

Diabetes, also known as diabetes mellitus, is a disease characterized by raised levels of blood sugar due to problems with insulin in the body. Insulin is a hormone that helps sugar move from the blood and get into the innumerable cells of your body to provide energy. When insulin becomes defective or deficient or both, sugar remains trapped in the blood, leading to raised blood sugar levels. According to the World Health Organization, nearly 171 million people in the world had diabetes in 2000, and it is projected that their number will increase to an alarming figure of 366 million by 2030. In the United States alone, more than 21 million people have one third of them are not even aware that they have this disease. The U.S. Government estimates that, annually, an additional 1.5 million people develop diabetes in this country. An uncontrolled or poorly controlled diabetes tends to cause two kinds of medical sudden medical emergencies and long-term complications. In diabetes emergencies, your blood sugar either rises too high or falls too low, or the acids in the blood become very high. These emergencies, if not handled in time, may prove life-threatening. On the other hand, an uncontrolled or poorly controlled diabetes for a prolonged period, tends to damage almost all vital organs of the body, a condition that may lead to dreadful events such as heart attack, stroke, kidney failure, blindness, and amputation. Sometimes the most common form of diabetes, called type 2 diabetes (which accounts for about 90 to 95 percent of all cases of diabetes), may not even show any symptoms and may remain undiagnosed for 9 to 12 years. By the time people are diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, it may have already caused some organ damage in the body. Diabetes is a devastating disease, responsible for untold human suffering, enormous medical cost, and productivity loss to society from disabilities caused to people with diabetes.

73 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2008