What is Diabetes?

Diabetes is a (long-term) chronic disease that has an impact on how your body uses food and converts it as energy.

Your body converts the most of the food you eat into sugar (glucose), which is then released into your system. Whenever your blood sugar levels increase, your pancreas will release insulin. Insulin works like a key; to allow blood sugar to get into your body's cells and use it as energy.

If you have diabetes, your body creates insufficient insulin or uses it wrongly. When insulin is insufficient or when cells stop responding to insulin, too much blood sugar stays in the system. Serious health issues like kidney disease, vision loss, and heart disease could potentially result from that.

Although there is no treatment or cure for diabetes yet, decreasing weight, eating well, and exercising can all be very beneficial for diabetes patients. Other things that helped:

- Take prescription medication
- Educate yourself on self-management & diabetes support
- Schedule and go for medical appointments.

Diabetes Subtypes

Type 1, type 2, and gestational diabetes (diabetes while pregnant) are the three common kinds of diabetes.

1. Type 1 Diabetes

It is thought to be brought on by an autoimmune response (the body mistakenly attacks itself). This reaction halts the insulin manufacturing in your body. Type 1 diabetes affects between 5–10% of diabetes patients.

Type 1 diabetes symptoms frequently appear suddenly. It is typically found in children, teenagers, and young adults. If you have type 1 diabetes, you must take insulin every day to stay alive. Type 1 diabetes is now incurable.

2. Type 2 Diabetes

In type 2 diabetes, your body has trouble utilizing insulin efficiently, making it challenging to keep your blood sugar levels within a reasonable range. 90–95% of diabetics have type 2 diabetes. Adults are often diagnosed with it since it takes years to develop (but more and more in children, teens, and young adults). It is critical to get your blood sugar checked if you are at risk because you might not show any symptoms. One healthy lifestyle change that can delay or prevent type 2 diabetes with;

- Losing weight.
- Eating healthy food.
- Being active.


3. Gestational diabetes

Gestational diabetes can develop in pregnant women who have never had the condition before. Your unborn kid may be more vulnerable to health problems if you have gestational diabetes. It usually goes away once your baby is born. It does, however, increase the risk of type 2 diabetes in later life. Your child is more likely to develop type 2 diabetes if they are obese as children or adolescents.

Prediabetes is characterized by blood sugar levels that are higher than usual but not high enough to be classified as type 2 diabetes. If you have prediabetes, you run a higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and stroke. However, there is good news. If you have prediabetes, you can use CDC-recognized lifestyle change programs to take proactive steps to reverse it.


Reference:
https://www.cdc.gov/diabetes/basics/diabetes.html