What happens if diabetes mellitus is not treated

The mother can develop complications such as high blood pressure preeclampsia or type 2 diabetes. She may also require cesarean delivery , commonly referred to as a C-section. Diabetes can lead to serious medical complications, but you can manage the condition with medications and lifestyle changes.

Avoid the most common diabetes complications with these helpful tips. Doctors treat diabetes with a few different medications. Some of these drugs are taken by mouth , while others are available as injections. Insulin is the main treatment for type 1 diabetes. There are four types of insulin that are most commonly used. Diet and exercise can help some people manage type 2 diabetes.

You may need to take more than one of these drugs. Some people with type 2 diabetes also take insulin. According to the Mayo Clinic, about 10 to 20 percent of women with gestational diabetes will need insulin to lower their blood sugar. Insulin is safe for the growing baby. The drug or combination of drugs that your doctor prescribes will depend on the type of diabetes you have — and its cause. Check out this list of the various medications that are available to treat diabetes.

Healthy eating is a central part of managing diabetes. In some cases, changing your diet may be enough to control the disease.

Your blood sugar level rises or falls based on the types of foods you eat. Starchy or sugary foods make blood sugar levels rise rapidly.

Protein and fat cause more gradual increases. Your medical team may recommend that you limit the amount of carbohydrates you eat each day. Work with a dietitian who can help you design a diabetes meal plan. Getting the right balance of protein, fat, and carbs can help you control your blood sugar.

Check out this guide to starting a type 1 diabetes diet. Eating the right types of foods can both control your blood sugar and help you lose any excess weight. Carb counting is an important part of eating for type 2 diabetes. A dietitian can help you figure out how many grams of carbohydrates to eat at each meal. In order to keep your blood sugar levels steady, try to eat small meals throughout the day.

Emphasize healthy foods such as:. Certain other foods can undermine efforts to keep your blood sugar in control. Discover the foods you should avoid if you have diabetes. Eating a well-balanced diet is important for both you and your baby during these nine months. Making the right food choices can also help you avoid diabetes medications. Watch your portion sizes, and limit sugary or salty foods.

Professional CGMs collect continuous blood glucose information over a period of time 72 hours to up to 14 days. Health care providers use this information to make treatment recommendations. Professional CGMs do not provide data to the person with diabetes.

Personal CGMs are used by the person and provide real-time blood glucose data on a small portable monitor or on a connected smart phone.

Alarms on the CGM system can be set to sound when blood glucose levels drop too low or climb too high, so the device can help people quickly identify worrisome changes in blood glucose. Previously, CGMs required frequent calibration with fingerstick glucose testing. Also their results were not accurate enough so that people always had to do a fingerstick to verify a reading on their CGM before calculating a dose of insulin for example, before meals or to correct a high blood sugar.

However, recent technological advances have improved CGMs and promise to continue doing so for the foreseeable future. They can now be worn for up to 14 days, often do not require calibration, and can be used for insulin dosing without fingerstick glucose confirmation.

Finally, there are now systems in which the CGM device communicates with insulin pumps Insulin Replacement Therapy Many people with diabetes require drugs to lower blood glucose levels, relieve symptoms, and prevent complications of diabetes.

CGM systems are particularly helpful in certain circumstances, such as in people with type 1 diabetes who have frequent, rapid changes in blood glucose particularly when the glucose levels sometimes go very low , which are difficult to identify with fingerstick testing.

Most people with diabetes should keep a record of their blood glucose levels and report them to their doctor or nurse for advice in adjusting the dose of insulin or the oral antihyperglycemic drug. Many people can learn to adjust the insulin dose on their own as necessary. Some people who have mild or early type 2 diabetes that is well-controlled with one or two drugs may be able to monitor their fingerstick glucose levels relatively infrequently.

Although urine can also be tested for the presence of glucose, checking urine is not a good way to monitor treatment or adjust therapy. Urine testing can be misleading because the amount of glucose in the urine may not reflect the current level of glucose in the blood.

Blood glucose levels can get very low or reasonably high without any change in the glucose levels in the urine. Doctors can monitor treatment using a blood test called hemoglobin A1C.

When the blood glucose levels are high, changes occur in hemoglobin, the protein that carries oxygen in the blood. These changes are in direct proportion to the blood glucose levels over an extended period. The higher the hemoglobin A1C level, the higher the person's glucose levels have been. Thus, unlike the blood glucose measurement, which reveals the level at a particular moment, the hemoglobin A1C measurement demonstrates whether the blood glucose levels have been controlled over the previous few months.

Achieving this level is difficult, but the lower the hemoglobin A1C level, the less likely people are to have complications. Doctors may recommend a slightly higher or lower target for certain people depending on their particular health situation.

Most doctors who specialize in diabetes care recommend that hemoglobin A1C be measured every 3 to 6 months. Fructosamine, an amino acid that has bonded with glucose, is also useful for measuring blood glucose control over a period of a few weeks and is generally used when hemoglobin A1C results are not reliable, such as in people who have abnormal forms of hemoglobin. People with type 1 diabetes sometimes receive transplantation of an entire pancreas or of only the insulin -producing cells from a donor pancreas.

This procedure may allow people with type 1 diabetes mellitus to maintain normal glucose levels. However, because immunosuppressant drugs must be given to prevent the body from rejecting the transplanted cells, pancreas transplantation Pancreas Transplantation Pancreas transplantation is the removal of a healthy pancreas from a recently deceased person or rarely a part of a pancreas from a living person and its transfer into person with severe diabetes The term brittle diabetes has been used to refer to people who have dramatic recurrent swings in blood glucose levels, often for no apparent reason.

However, this term is no longer used. People with type 1 diabetes may have more frequent swings in blood glucose levels because insulin production is completely absent. Infection, delayed movement of food through the stomach, and other hormonal disorders may also contribute to blood glucose swings.

In all people who have difficulty controlling blood glucose, doctors look for other disorders that might be causing the problem and also give people additional education on how to monitor diabetes and take their drugs. Older people need to follow the same general principles of diabetes management—education, diet, exercise, and drugs—as younger people.

However, risking hypoglycemia Hypoglycemia Hypoglycemia is abnormally low levels of sugar glucose in the blood. Managing diabetes can be more difficult for older people. Poor eyesight may make it hard for them to read glucose meters and dose scales on insulin syringes.

They may have problems manipulating the syringe because they have arthritis or Parkinson disease or have had a stroke. In addition to learning about diabetes itself, older people may have to learn how to fit management of diabetes in with their management of other disorders. Learning about how to avoid complications, such as dehydration, skin breakdown, and circulation problems, and to manage factors that can contribute to complications of diabetes, such as high blood pressure and high cholesterol levels, is especially important.

Such problems become more common as people age, whether they have diabetes or not. Many older people have difficulty following a healthy, balanced diet that can control blood glucose levels and weight. Changing long-held food preferences and dietary habits may be hard.

Some older people have other disorders that can be affected by diet and may not understand how to integrate the dietary recommendations for their various disorders. Some older people cannot control what they eat because someone else is cooking for them—at home or in a nursing home or other institution. When people with diabetes do not do their own cooking, the people who shop and prepare meals for them must also understand the diet that is needed. Older people and their caregivers usually benefit from meeting with a dietitian to develop a healthy, feasible eating plan.

Older people may have a difficult time adding exercise to their daily life, particularly if they have not been active or if they have a disorder that limits their movement, such as arthritis. However, they may be able to add exercise to their usual routine. For example, they can walk instead of drive or climb the stairs instead of take the elevator.

Also, many community organizations offer exercise programs designed for older people. Taking the drugs used to treat diabetes, particularly insulin , may be difficult for some older people. For those with vision problems or other problems that make accurately filling a syringe difficult, a caregiver can prepare the syringes ahead of time and store them in the refrigerator. People whose insulin dose is stable may purchase prefilled syringes. Prefilled insulin pen devices may be easier for people with physical limitations.

Some of these devices have large numbers and easy-to-turn dials. Poor vision, limited manual dexterity due to arthritis, tremor, or stroke, or other physical limitations may make monitoring blood glucose levels more difficult for older people.

However, special monitors are available. Some have large numerical displays that are easier to read. Some provide audible instructions and results. Some monitors read blood glucose levels through the skin and do not require a blood sample. People can consult a diabetes educator to determine which meter is most appropriate. The most common complication of treating high blood glucose levels is low blood glucose levels hypoglycemia Hypoglycemia Hypoglycemia is abnormally low levels of sugar glucose in the blood.

The risk is greatest for older people who are frail, who are sick enough to require frequent hospital admissions, or who are taking several drugs. Of all available drugs to treat diabetes, long-acting sulfonylurea drugs are most likely to cause low blood glucose levels in older people. When they take these drugs, they are also more likely to have serious symptoms, such as fainting and falling, and to have difficulty thinking or using parts of the body due to low blood glucose levels.

Hypoglycemia in older people may be less obvious than in younger people. Confusion caused by hypoglycemia may be mistaken for dementia Dementia Dementia is a slow, progressive decline in mental function including memory, thinking, judgment, and the ability to learn. Typically, symptoms include memory loss, problems using language and Also, people who have difficulty communicating as after a stroke Overview of Stroke A stroke occurs when an artery to the brain becomes blocked or ruptures, resulting in death of an area of brain tissue due to loss of its blood supply cerebral infarction and symptoms that No treatments prevent the onset of type 1 diabetes mellitus.

Some drugs may induce remission of early type 1 diabetes in some people, possibly because they prevent the immune system from destroying the cells of the pancreas. However, these drugs cause side effects that limit their use. Type 2 diabetes can be prevented with lifestyle changes. Metformin and acarbose , drugs that are used to treat diabetes, may reduce the risk of diabetes in people with impaired glucose regulation.

The following are some English-language resources that may be useful. Learn more here about what causes acetone breath and when to see a doctor. Kidney disease produces few or no symptoms in its early form. When symptoms appear, there may already be damage. This is one reason why it is important to know as soon as possible if diabetes is present and to manage blood sugar levels.

How does diabetes affect the kidneys? Click here to learn more. People with diabetes often have cardiovascular symptoms, such as high blood pressure. They may also have high cholesterol levels and obesity, which are risk factors for heart disease. Of all the complications of diabetes, cardiovascular disease is the one that is most likely to be fatal, according to research.

Poor circulation can also contribute to slow wound healing and problems in the extremities, such as the feet. High blood pressure, chest pain, or abnormal heart rhythms are important warning signs. Whether they are due to diabetes or another condition, people should not ignore them. How does diabetes increase the risk of stroke? Find out more here. Long-term high blood sugar levels can damage nerves throughout the body, particularly those that affect sensation in the hands or feet.

If a person has numbness or tingling, they may have nerve damage, or diabetic neuropathy. Some people with diabetes experience nerve pain, which can feel like electrical sensations or burning. Nerve pain can happen anywhere, but it is especially common in the feet and hands. People who experience these symptoms should contact a doctor. Redness, swelling, or warmth in the legs can indicate a medical urgency that needs immediate attention at an emergency room.

What is diabetic neuropathy and how does it affect a person? Anyone who experiences any of the above symptoms should see a doctor, as soon as they can, whether or not they have diabetes, as they may have diabetes without knowing it. The sooner a person starts to manage high blood sugar, the better chance they have of slowing its progress and reducing the risk of complications. To maintain the right amount of blood sugar, the body needs insulin, a hormone that delivers this sugar to the cells.

When insulin is lacking, blood…. Diabetic shock is not a medical term, but people sometimes use it to…. Dietary glucose is the body's main source of energy. News Resources Blog. News Resources Blog Sites. Welcome to the future of medicine. Where together, we go boldly. Industry Profile Discover how scientists and researchers are advancing science. The year journey yielding a new weapon against cancer PhRMA. Costs and Consequences of Not Treating Diabetes.

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