What Is Diabetes?

American Diabetes Association Complete Guide to Diabetes
by American Diabetes Association

The most complete self-care guide available from the leaders in diabetes information

The most up-to-date information on:

• New Diabetes Drugs and Insulin
• Achieving Blood Sugar Control
• Preventing Complications
• Handling Emergencies
• Testing
• Using a Meter
• Insulin Pumps
• Nutrition
• Exercise
• Sexuality
• Pregnancy
• Insurance
• And Much, Much More

The American Diabetes Association - the nation's leading health organization supporting diabetes research, information, and advocacy - has revised this one-volume sourcebook to bring you all the information you need to live an active, healthy life with diabetes.

This comprehensive home reference gives you information on the best self-care techniques and latest medical breakthroughs. No matter what type of diabetes you have, this extraordinary guide will answer all your questions.

Find out how to:

• Choose the best health-care team for you
• Maintain tight control over blood glucose levels
• Buy, use, and store insulin
• Recognize warning signs of low blood sugar
• Design an effective exercise and weight-loss plan
• Save money on supplies
• Maximize insurance coverage
• Balance family demands and diabetes
• And more

Chapter 1

When you or someone you love has diabetes, you discover that you must think about a part of life that others take for granted. Your never-changing goal becomes reaching a subtle balance between glucose and insulin. The more you learn about diabetes, the better you can be at your balancing act, and the richer your life shared with this chronic disease can be.

Types of Diabetes

Diabetes refers to a set of several different diseases. The most common types of diabetes are type 1, or immune-mediated diabetes mellitus, and type 2, or insulin-resistant di- abetes mellitus. A third type of diabetes, gestational diabetes mellitus, occurs during some pregnancies.

All types of diabetes have similar symptoms, because all forms of the disease result in too much sugar, or glucose, in the blood. This is because your body is unable to remove glucose from your blood and deliver it to the cells in your body. Your cells use glucose as a source of energy in order to stay alive. But the reasons why your body cannot use glucose from the blood are different for type 1 and type 2 diabetes.

People with type 1 diabetes do not make enough insulin. Insulin is a small protein made by the pancreas that helps the body use or store glucose from food. People with type 1 diabetes can be treated with injections of insulin. In contrast, people with type 2 diabetes, like women with gestational diabetes, do make insulin, but for some reason, the cells in their bodies are resistant to insulin's action or they don't make enough insulin. In all types of diabetes, if glucose does not get into the cells and tissues that need it, it accumulates in the blood.

About half of all cases of type 1 diabetes appear in childhood or in the early teenage years. For this reason, it used to be called juvenile-onset diabetes. If your symptoms first appeared during the early teenage years, your doctor probably suspected diabetes right away. If you were a young child when the disease developed, it might have occurred so fast that you went into a coma, before anyone suspected diabetes. Type 2 diabetes most often develops in adulthood and used to be called adult-onset diabetes. Usually, it does not appear suddenly. Instead, you may have no noticeable symptoms or only mild symptoms for years before diabetes is detected, perhaps during a routine exam or blood test. Gestational diabetes only appears during pregnancy in women with no previous history of type 1 or type 2 diabetes and goes away after pregnancy. Pregnant women are tested for gestational diabetes.

All people with diabetes have one thing in common. They have too much sugar, or glucose, in their blood. People with very high or poorly controlled blood glucose levels share many similar symptoms:

• an unusual thirst
• a frequent desire to urinate
• blurred vision
• a feeling of being tired most of the time for no apparent reason

People with type 2 diabetes may also experience leg pain that may indicate nerve damage or poor circulation. Many people with type 1 diabetes and some people with type 2 diabetes also find that they lose weight even though they are hungrier than usual and are eating more.

Even if they have lost weight, people with type 2 diabetes still tend to be overweight. Three-fourths of all people with type 2 diabetes are or have been obese - that is, they are at least 20 percent over their desirable body weight (see the chart of suggested body weights for adults). Type 2 diabetes tends to develop in people who have extra body fat. Where you carry your excess fat may determine whether you get type 2 diabetes: Extra fat above the hips (central body obesity) is riskier than fat in the hips and thighs for developing type 2 diabetes. And leading an inactive "couch potato" lifestyle can also lead to diabetes. It also contributes to obesity.

If you have recently been diagnosed with diabetes, you are not alone. Nearly 16 million Americans - about one of every 17 people - have the disease. About 1,800 new cases of diabetes are diagnosed each day, with about 655,000 new cases each year. Ninety to ninety-five percent of all cases of diabetes in people over age 20 are type 2 diabetes. And half of all people with type 2 diabetes are unaware they even have the disease. Because of the nature of type 2 diabetes, it is possible to have mild symptoms (what you feel) or signs (what the doctor can detect) of type 2 diabetes for years before diabetes worsens. In contrast, few cases of type 1 diabetes go undetected for long. The symptoms of type 1 diabetes are severe enough that the person goes to the doctor for help.

Who Has Diabetes?

Almost 16 million Americans have diabetes. This is about 6 percent of the people in the country. In 1999, it was estimated that 500,000 to 1 million people had type 1 diabetes. It is hard to get an exact count of the number of people with diabetes because we have no nationwide diabetes registry. Slightly under half of the people with type 1 diabetes are children and teenagers aged 20 and younger. Type 1 diabetes is more common in whites than in African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans, and Native Americans.

In 1999, it was estimated that about 9.5 million people had diagnosed type 2 diabetes. Another 5 to 6 million people are undiagnosed. It is common in older people. Nearly 11 percent of Americans age 65 to 74 have type 2 diabetes. It is more common in some ethnic groups than others. In Americans age 45 to 74, over 14 percent of Mexican Americans and Puerto Rican Americans have type 2 diabetes, over 10 percent of African Americans have type 2 diabetes, and about 6 percent of Cuban Americans and whites have type 2 diabetes. Type 2 diabetes is even more common in Native Americans: In some groups, almost half of adults age 30 to 64 have type 2 diabetes.

About 135,000 women develop gestational diabetes each year. Of these, about 40 percent get type 2 diabetes within 15 years.

Copyright © 2000 by American Diabetes Association. Excerpted by permission of Bantam, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

About the Author

The American Diabetes Assocation is the nation's leading voluntary health organization supporting diabetes research, information, and advocacy. Founded in 1940, the Assocation provides services to communities across the country. Its mission is to prevent and cure diabetes and to improve the lives of all people affected by diabetes.