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Understanding your Long-term Prospects if you have Diabetes

Author: JuliaHanf Total views: 4 Word Count: 487

The long term prospects for a person with diabetes are not set in stone. In many cases, they are a matter of choice.

In order to head off problems, you must understand the possible complications that accompany diabetes and its treatments.

People taking insulin can experience hypoglycemia--low blood sugar. Hypoglycemia can cause many problems, including coma. Muscle weakness and headaches are common signs of mild hypoglycemia.

Missing an insulin dose or having an infection can cause diabetic acidosis-a life threatening condition. Type 1 diabetics are more prone to diabetic acidosis than Type 2 diabetics are.

Insulin helps to burn body fat as well as regulates glucose in the blood. The body uses stored fat when the insulin level drops dramatically; this produces a ketone smell on the breath. The body attempts to restore its balance by rapid breathing, but rapid breathing only partially solves the problem.

Long term, diabetic retinopathy - a generation of the retina from damaged blood vessels - is another possibility. Kidney malfunction, as the kidneys come to filter less efficiently due to gradual destruction of the glomeruli, is also common.

Fortunately, these complications can be avoided.

The possible long term effects of diabetes are very well known and there have been developed a number of strategies for dealing with them.

The first defense is proper self-care. Proper self-care helps to keep the insulin and glucose levels normal. Proper self-care also preserves the body's fitness to deal with any problems. Self-care includes keeping the blood pressure normal, so that complications from high blood pressure are avoided.

Methods are being developed which go beyond self-care. These methods target the two primary malfunctions of diabetes: insufficient insulin production (Type 1) and inadequate insulin use (Type 2). While there are other types of diabetes, Type 1 and Type 2 account for 95% of long-term cases. These new methods include organ transplant and gene therapy.

Organ transplant for a diabetic means replacing the malfunctioning pancreas of a Type 1 diabetic with another pancreas. The surgery is done only if other methods of treatment have failed. In the past thirty years, transplant methods have greatly improved. New drugs now can keep the immune system from rejecting the organ. Gene therapy may soon be used to eliminate the need for autoimmune suppression medications.

In addition to helping immune system suppression, gene therapy can be directly used to help diabetics. The use of gene therapy to treat autoimmune disorders such as Type 1 diabetes is advancing. This research also offers hope to Type 2 patients.

Gene therapy holds out the promise of being able to adjust the efficiency with which the body uses insulin, the characteristic of Type 2. Gene therapy may be able to affect the gene that controls the production of insulin beta cells.

Diabetes research is active and progressive. Soon your diabetes may be diminished or cured through some of the new methods.

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About the Author

Julia Hanf author of the book How To Play the Diabetes Diet Game and Win Through a real life crisis Julia figured out how to live diabetes free. Visit http://www.yourdiabetescure.com and learn more about your solution for diabetes.

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