Live Well - May 2008

Living with diabetes

Every year nearly 800,000 Americans discover they have diabetes. It is dramatically on the rise in all segments of the population—men, women and children of every race. The good news is that diabetes can be controlled.

What Is Diabetes?
Diabetes is a disorder of the endocrine system. Normally, the carbohydrates in food are broken down during digestion and converted to glucose. This simple sugar is a prime energy source for the body’s cells. Insulin, a hormone produced in the pancreas, regulates the level of glucose in the bloodstream and allows it to be used by the cells.

Diabetes disrupts this process. Either the pancreas produces insufficient insulin or the body fails to respond properly to the insulin it does produce. In either case, glucose cannot be absorbed by the cells, and a very high concentration of this sugar remains in the bloodstream.

There are two basic types of diabetes. Type 2 diabetes, which occurs when the body doesn’t use insulin properly, accounts for 90 percent of all cases. Type 1 diabetes, which accounts for the remaining 10 percent, occurs when the body produces little or no insulin. Usually diagnosed in children and young adults, most of whom have a family history of the disease, type 1 diabetes requires daily doses of insulin.

The symptoms of diabetes include frequent urination, increased thirst, unexplained weight loss, weakness, fatigue, and unusual hunger.

Simple lifestyle adjustments can go a long way toward controlling diabetes. In fact, many people diagnosed with type 2 diabetes can learn to control their glucose levels through lifestyle adjustments alone, so that no medication is required. Furthermore, sticking to a healthy way of life can reduce the risk of diabetes developing in the first place, even for people in high-risk groups.

• Maintain a healthy weight.
• Eat a healthy diet.
• Limit alcohol consumption.
• Exercise regularly.
• Have regular medical checkups.

If you are diagnosed with diabetes, you need to work closely with your physician and learn all the details you can about the disease so that you can take the right steps to reduce your risk of complications.

This e-mail is brought to you by Live Well, a community wellness initiative of Prattville Baptist Hospital. For information, visit www.baptistfirst.org/livewell.htm or call 2-1-1.