Kieran McDonough

5/15/12

Mrs. Alfarano

Anatomy H pd. 4
Diabetes

Diabetes mellitus is a disease that affects 25.8 million children and adults across the
United States. Diabetes, in short, is a chronic disease in which there are high levels of sugar in
the blood. There are three types of diabetes, and all effect different types of people and have
slightly different symtoms. There are Type 1 diabetes, Type 2 diabetes, and Gestational diabetes.
Type 1 diabetes, formerly known as juvenile diabetes, is usually diagnosed in children
and young adults. In type 1 diabetes, the body does not produce the hormone insulin, which is a
hormone that is needed to convert sugar, starches and other food into energy needed for daily
life. Type 1 diabetes is rare because only 5% of people with diabetes have this form of the
disease. Because the body is unable to regulate blood sugar, the person must monitor and control
their blood sugar themselves. When blood sugar is high, they might be very thirsty, hungry, tired
or fatigued, blurred vision, and weight loss. Also, when the blood sugar is too high, it becomes
dangerous because the person will have breathing problems, nausea, or stomach pains. When
blood sugar is too low, the person might experience headaches, hunger, anxiety, sweating, and
weakness. There is no way to avoid getting Type 1 diabetes because you are born that way.
Treatment includes close watch by health care providers in the first few weeks of diagnosis and
strict monitoring of blood sugar and insulin injections when the diabetes is recognized as stable.
Type 2 diabetes is more prevelant in adults and the elderly, although some young people
can develop it. Type 2 diabetes results from insulin resistance in your body, which is when your
fat, liver, and muscle cells do not respond correctly to insulin, and as a result, blood sugar does
not get into these cells to be stored for energy. Type 2 diabetes develops slowly over time, and
overweight people are more liable to develop it because fat makes it harder for the body to use

Kieran McDonough

5/15/12

Mrs. Alfarano
Anatomy H pd. 4
insulin correctly. It can also develop in people who are too thin, which is common among the
elderly. Although technically type 2 diabetes is avoidable, family history and genes play a large
role. Low activity level and exercise, poor diet, and excess body weight around the waist
increase your risk for the disease, so living a healthy lifestyle is key to avoiding it. The
symptoms and treatment of Type 2 are generally the same as Type 1.
The third type of diabetes is Gestational diabetes, which only occurs in women who are
pregnant. Pregnancy hormones can block insulin from doing its job, causing low or high blood
sugar levels in the woman. The symptoms are not very severe for the mother typically, and the
person more in danger would be the child in utero. After delivery, in almost all cases, the woman
returns back to normal blood sugar levels and is free of diabetes. The baby might also experience
some blood sugar problems in its first few days, but that goes back to normal also.
My aunt Sue suffers from diabetes, specifically type 2. She told me she had a family
history of diabetes and wasnt doing her part to try and avoid it. She was diagnosed during her
third pregnancy, but the doctors explained that the disease was most likely a result of her second
pregnancy, where she birthed a heavy baby. When asked if her life was much different after
having diabetes, she said that it was a big change at first but now her diabetic lifestyle is
generally easy and unnoticeable. When asked what she does to monitor and treat it, she said that
she checks her blood sugar at least twice a day and she has an insulin pump attached at all times.
When I asked if she ever had any complications with her treatments, she told me that on vacation
recently her insulin pump broke and she had to be extra careful with her food intake and such
until the health care company sent her a new one overnight.

Kieran McDonough

5/15/12

Mrs. Alfarano

Anatomy H pd. 4
Works Cited

http://www.diabetes.org/?loc=logo
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0002194/
Sue McCullough - Aunt