Home | Health | Diseases And Conditions | Diabetes

Risk Factors of Diabetes are Within Your Control

By: Bob Sherman


Read More About Diabetes

What is Diabetes?

Diabetes involves the lack of capacity to regulate the level of glucose in the blood. The primary hormone associated with diabetes is insulin. During the digestion process carbohydrates and starches are broken down into glucose. Insulin allows liver, muscle and fat cells to accept glucose from the blood and accumulate it as glycogen.

In type 1 diabetes insulin has ceased to be produced by the body. In patients with Type 1 diabetes the autoimmune system, for some reason, destroyed the insulin producing cells of the pancreas. Patients must take insulin for the rest of their lives, normally via injection, in order to control glucose in the blood.

In type 2 diabetes patients produce insufficient insulin or are insulin resistant. They may require external insulin, though nutritional and lifestyle alterations along with medications often help control symptoms About 55% of individuals with type 2 diabetes are obese and 80% are overweight. It is the increased fatty acid mobilization that gives rise to an increase in insulin resistance. Visceral fat in the area of the abdomen that surrounds internal organs plays a very significant role. The huge upsurge in type 2 diabetes with the western lifestyle and increasing obesity have shown that obesity plays a main role in inducing type 2 diabetes.

Diabetes can produce life threatening complications. These complications include stroke, blindness, heart disease, kidney disease, and sciatic nerve dysfunction. Sciatica, itself, can produce loss of sensation and movement in your legs. These results are all serious and put at risk your quality of life.

Patterns of Eating and Lifestyle are Under Your Control

Type 2 diabetes is increasingly found in our overfed and under exercised obese population. It is sometimes called an obesity disease or a prosperity disease. Type 2 diabetes is seldom detected in third world countries where people are poor and cannot obtain the highly refined, high fat diets of developed countries.

The occurrence of obesity and type 2 diabetes can be strongly linked to the excessive consumption of processed and manufactured consumables like cookies, biscuits, white bread, chocolates, and ice cream. If you look at the ingredients of many processed foods you'll discover refined carbohydrates like sugar in a number of forms including raw sugar, brown sugar, corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, cane juice, dextrose, maltose, and a host of other ingredients. These ingredients generally come from natural carbohydrates with all the healthy fiber and starch eliminated.

These sugars rapidly enter the blood stream and cause insulin production to soar as the body tries to normalize the rapid increase in blood sugar. As the rush of insulin does its job of removing sugars from the blood stream you often feel very weary and exhausted since too much sugar was eliminated from the blood stream. You then desire more sugary refreshments and this cycle begins again.

The result of all this refined sugar is that your body converts much of this excess sugar to fat. And, fat increases body mass and elevates triglycerides in the blood. This elevates the blood pressure and lowers the effectiveness of insulin, eventually resulting in diabetes.

There are other lifestyle causes of high blood sugar. Long term stress is a cause of elevated glucose levels. because stress, itself, produces hormones that affect blood glucose levels. Other risk factors for diabetes include smoking (raises sugar levels in the blood and reduces insulin effectiveness), high cholesterol and high triglyceride levels, and extreme alcohol use.

On the whole, type 2 diabetes is largely a lifestyle choice. It is largely avoidable by taking part in an exercise program and eating a healthy diet low in fats and refined carbohydrates. If you are in danger of getting diabetes, you ought to check your medical doctor and adhere to a prescribed plan of lifestyle changes This very well may result in a long and vigorous life.

Article Source: http://depositarticles.com/

Your future health within your control. If you are motivated to learn more about exercise and nutritions diets you're invited to click to Carbohydrates Facts and Weight Loss Support where you will find helpful videos and great articles to help you get moving toward a long and vigorous life.

Please Rate this Article

 

Not yet Rated

Click the XML Icon Above to Receive Diabetes Articles Via RSS!

counter easy hit

Powered by Article Dashboard