What is Diabetes ? The end products of carbohydrate-digestion
are simple sugars (e.g. glucose). From the intestines, this sugar gets absorbed into the blood-stream. Consequently, the blood-sugar level rises. At this time, the pencreatic secretion insulin enters the blood-stream and strives to bring down the blood-glucose level. If there is a deficiency of insuline or if the available insulin cannot be utilised by the body, the blood-sugar level rises abnormally. This sugar, accumulated in the blood, finally spills over into the urine. This disorder is termed
''dibetes mellitus'' . There are two types of diabete : juvenile or insuline dependent
diabetes mellitus
(IDDM) and maturity onset or non-insuline-dependent diabetes mellitus
(NIDDM).In India, the incidence of juvinile diabetes is barely 1-2%. The rest of the patients suffer from the second variety of the disease. Juvenile diabetes and maturity onset diabetes differ somewhat in their symptoms and treatment.
IT''S COMPLICATIONS :-
The dreadfulness of diabetes lies in its complications. Some complications can arise at any stage of the disease. Such acute or short-term complications include unconsciousness,boils,carbuncles and acute gangrene. A diabetic may become unconscious under two different circumstances : when the blood-sugar level rise too high (hyoperglycemia) or when the blood-sugar level pluges too low (hypoglycemia). The treatments for two conditins are entirely different. Hence every diabetic and his near ones should know about to distinguish between the two conditions. In the long run, diabetes disrupts the functioning of almost all the systems of the body. Such ''chronic'' complications of the diabetes cannot be satisfactorily prevented even the best treatment. Therefore, diabetes should be prevented.