What’s Diabetes Mellitus?

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Diabetes mellitus is a broad term that describes a condition in which a person ends up having too much sugar, or glucose, in their bloodstream and not enough getting into their cells to be burned as energy. While all types of diabetes have the same end result, there are very different conditions that fall under the umbrella of this term.
Type 1 diabetes is a type of diabetes mellitus in which a person’s blood sugar becomes high because their body can no longer make insulin, the hormone that moves glucose out of the bloodstream and into cells, where it is used to make power. Type 1 diabetes occurs when the beta cells in the pancreas, which produce insulin, are destroyed. Usually this is due to an autoimmune disease, in which the person’s immune system attacks and destroys beta cells.

While we know that autoimmune diseases are genetic, it is not yet known what triggers the autoimmune response. It can occur at any time. A person can therefore be diagnosed as having type 1 diabetes at any age, and not just in childhood as previously thought. Also, by the time a person is diagnosed as diabetic, antibodies that kill beta cells have been at work for some time: the pancreas has the ability to compensate for the loss of insulin-producing cells by up to 90% of the beta cells have been destroyed.

Type 2 diabetes is a completely different condition and accounts for nine out of ten people with diabetes mellitus. People with this disease still produce insulin; in fact, they usually produce more insulin than they actually need. Their bodies have just become resistant to insulin, which means they use it much less efficiently than they should.

The causes of type 2 diabetes are more complicated than type 1 diabetes. Some people are diagnosed with type 2 as they get older and their bodies presumably become less efficient. However, an increasing number of type 2 diabetics are developing the disease as a result of poor diet, lack of exercise and obesity, particularly in the United States. In fact, until very recently this disease was thought to occur only in middle-aged and elderly people; it is now being diagnosed in younger adults and even children, presumably due to the deterioration of healthy practices such as proper nutrition and exercise and the growing number of obese people in the United States.

Whether the disease is type 1 or type 2, the symptoms of diabetes are the same. When blood sugar is too high, the kidneys filter out a large part of the excess glucose, unfortunately taking a lot of liquids with them. As a result, a diabetic with uncontrolled sugars suffers from constant thirst and frequent urination. Other symptoms of diabetes include muscle cramps, caused by the body filtering potassium from the bloodstream along with glucose and fluids, and blurred vision, caused by high glucose levels in the eyes. Furthermore, uncontrolled diabetes mellitus often results in rapid weight loss: although the person may eat much more than normal and although their blood sugar is high, the body’s cells are essentially starving because they are unable to access any of the that glucose.

Anyone with diabetes mellitus struggles with the same end result: too much blood glucose. However, as this occurs for different reasons depending on whether the disease is type 1 or type 2, the treatment is very different for each. Type 1 diabetics cannot make their own insulin, so they must be injected with it. The amount of insulin varies based on the individual’s diet, lifestyle, and other factors.

Type 2 diabetics, on the other hand, usually take medications to help them use their insulin more efficiently. It is also usually recommended to exercise regularly and eat a healthier, lower-carb diet. Indeed, in some type 2 diabetics, exercise and diet alone can control and even reverse the onset of diabetes mellitus. However, type 2 diabetics who have poor control of their blood sugars may need to compensate for their body’s lack of efficiency by injecting supplemental insulin.

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