What is diabetes ?
Diabetes is a disease that occurs when your blood sugar (glucose) level is too high. It develops when your pancreas that’s not enough insulin or not at all, or when your body does not respond properly to the effects of insulin. Diabetes affects people of all ages. Most forms of diabetes are chronic (lifelong) and all forms are manageable with medication and/or lifestyle changes.
Glucose (sugar) mainly comes from carbohydrates in your food and drinks. It is your body’s main source of energy. Your blood carries glucose to every cell in your body to use for energy.
When glucose is in your bloodstream, it needs help – a “key” – to get to its final destination. That key is insulin (a hormone). If your pancreas doesn’t produce enough insulin or your body doesn’t use it properly, glucose builds up in your bloodstream, causing high blood sugar (hyperglycemia).
Over time, persistently high blood sugar can lead to health problems, such as cardiac diseasenerve damage and eye problems.
The technical name for diabetes is diabetes mellitus. Another condition shares the term “diabetes” – diabetes insipidus – but they are distinct. They share the name “diabetes” because they both cause increased thirst and frequent urination. Diabetes insipidus is much rarer than diabetes mellitus.
What are the types of diabetes?
There are several types of diabetes. The most common forms include:
- Type 2 diabetes: With this type, your body does not produce enough insulin and/or your body’s cells do not respond normally to insulin (insulin resistance). This is the most common type of diabetes. It mainly affects adults, but children can also be affected.
- Prediabetes: This type is the stage before type 2 diabetes. Your blood sugar levels are higher than normal, but not high enough for an official diagnosis of type 2 diabetes to be made.
- Type 1 diabetes: This guy is a autoimmune disease in which your immune system attacks and destroys the insulin-producing cells in your pancreas for unknown reasons. Up to 10% of people with diabetes have type 1. This diabetes is usually diagnosed in children and young adults, but it can develop at any age.
- Gestational Diabetes: This type develops in some people during pregnancy. Gestational diabetes usually goes away after pregnancy. However, if you have gestational diabetes, you are at higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes later in life.
Other types of diabetes include:
- Type 3c diabetes: This form of diabetes occurs when your pancreas suffers damage (other than autoimmune damage), which affects its ability to produce insulin. Pancreatitis, pancreatic cancer, cystic fibrosis And hemochromatosis can all lead to damage to the pancreas that causes diabetes. Having your pancreas removed (pancreatectomy) also gives rise to type 3c.
- Latent autoimmune diabetes in adults (LADA): Like type 1 diabetes, LADA also results from an autoimmune reaction, but it develops much more slowly than type 1. People diagnosed with LADA are usually over 30 years old.
- Maturity-onset diabetes of the young (MODY): MODY, also called monogenic diabetes, occurs due to a genetic mutation This affects how your body produces and uses insulin. There are currently over 10 different types of MODY. It affects up to 5% of people with diabetes and is usually hereditary.
- Neonatal diabetes: This is a rare form of diabetes that occurs during the first six months of life. It is also a form of monogenic diabetes. About 50% of babies with neonatal diabetes have a lifelong form called permanent neonatal diabetes mellitus. For the other half, the disease disappears a few months after its onset, but it can reappear later in life. This is called transient neonatal diabetes mellitus.
- Frail diabetes: Fragile diabetes is a form of type 1 diabetes characterized by frequent and severe episodes of hyperglycemia and hypoglycemia. This instability often leads to hospitalization. In rare cases, a pancreas transplant may be necessary to permanently treat brittle diabetes.
Is diabetes common?
Diabetes is common. In the United States, approximately 37.3 million people have diabetes, or about 11% of the population. Type 2 diabetes is the most common form, accounting for 90-95% of all cases of diabetes.
Around 537 million adults worldwide have diabetes. Experts predict this number will reach 643 million by 2030 and 783 million by 2045.
