Diabetes—“The Silent Killer”

Behind the Name

The term “diabetes mellitus” comes from a Greek word meaning “to siphon” and a Latin word meaning “sweet like honey.” These words aptly describe the disorder, for water passes through the person who has diabetes as if it were being siphoned from the mouth through the urinary tract and right out of the body. Furthermore, the urine is sweet with sugar. In fact, prior to the discovery of more efficient techniques, one test for diabetes was to pour a patient’s urine near an anthill. If the insects were attracted, this indicated the presence of sugar.

What Is Diabetes?

Our bodies convert the food we eat into energy that we can use. This function is as essential as breathing. In the stomach and the intestines, food is broken down into more basic elements, including a type of sugar, glucose. The pancreas reacts to sugar by producing insulin, which helps the sugar pass into the body cells. Then the sugar can be burned for energy.

When a person has diabetes, either his pancreas does not produce enough insulin or his body does not utilize insulin well. As a result, the sugar in the bloodstream cannot pass into the body’s cells to be utilized. Explains the book Understanding Insulin Dependent Diabetes: “The blood sugar then rises to a high level and overflows through the kidney into the urine.” Untreated diabetics may experience frequent urination and other symptoms.

Type 1 Diabetes

This type of diabetes was previously known as juvenile diabetes, since it is the type found mostly in children and young adults. But it can afflict people of any age. While the cause of diabetes is not known, there are various factors that some believe are linked to Type 1 diabetes:

1. Inheritance (genetic)

2. Autoimmunity (the body becomes allergic to one of its own tissues or types of cells—in this case, in the pancreas)

3. Environmental (viral or chemical)

It is possible that viral infections and other factors result in damage to islet cells (the groups of cells within the pancreas where the insulin is made). As more and more islet cells are destroyed, the person moves closer to having diabetes.

Diabetics exhibit a number of symptoms:

1. Frequent urination

2. Extreme thirst

3. Frequent hunger; the body is hungry for the energy it isn’t getting

4. Weight loss. When the body can’t get sugar into its cells, it burns its own fat and protein for energy, resulting in weight loss

5. Irritability. If the diabetic is getting up frequently at night to urinate, he cannot sleep soundly. Behavior changes may result

In Type 1 diabetes, the pancreas is producing little or no insulin. In such cases, insulin must be taken daily, usually by injection (insulin is destroyed in the stomach if taken orally).

Type 2 Diabetes

Not to be confused with Type 1 diabetes, it is a condition in which the body is not producing enough insulin or is not using it efficiently. It is the most common type in adults over the age of 40 and tends to come on more gradually. There is a hereditary component to this illness, and it is often worsened by improper diet or by overweight. In many cases pills can be used, at least initially, to stimulate the pancreas to make more insulin. The pills are not insulin.

Dangers of Diabetes

The body needs fuel to keep it going. If it is unable to utilize glucose, it turns to body fats and protein. However, when the body burns fat, waste products called ketones are formed. Ketones build up in the blood and spill into the urine. Because these ketones are more acidic than healthy body tissues, high blood levels of ketones may lead to a serious condition called ketoacidosis.

It is also dangerous for a diabetic when his blood sugar falls below the normal range (hypoglycemia). The diabetic is alerted to this condition by unpleasant symptoms. He may feel shaky, sweaty, tired, hungry, irritable, or confused or have a rapid heartbeat, blurred vision, headaches, numbness, or tingling around the mouth and lips. He may even go into seizures or pass out. Proper diet and regulated eating times can often prevent such problems.

If the symptoms listed above do occur, taking in simple sugars, perhaps some fruit juice or glucose tablets, may bring the blood sugar back to a safer level until other food can be eaten. In severe cases, glucagon must be given by injection. This is a hormone that promotes the release of stored sugar from the liver, which will raise the blood sugar. The parent of a diabetic child would want to inform the child’s school and bus driver or day-care provider about the child’s condition.

Long-Term Complications

A person with diabetes may experience long-term complications, including heart attack, stroke, eye problems, kidney disease, foot or leg problems, and frequent infections. These complications are caused by damage to blood vessels, damage to nerves, and inability to fight infections. Not all diabetics, however, develop these long-term problems.

Keeping blood-sugar levels close to the normal range may delay or reduce the harmful effects of these complications. In addition, keeping weight and blood pressure levels in normal range and not smoking may be very effective ways to reduce risks. The diabetic must get plenty of exercise, maintain a proper diet, and stay on his prescribed medication.

“Untreated diabetes leads to ketosis, the accumulation of ketones, products of fat breakdown in the blood; this is followed by acidosis (accumulation of acid in the blood) with nausea and vomiting. As the toxic products of disordered carbohydrate and fat metabolism continue to build up, the patient goes into diabetic coma.”—Encyclopædia Britannica.