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Diabetes And Management
What is diabetes?
To answer that, you first need to understand the role of insulin in your body.
When you eat, your body turns food into sugars, or glucose. At that point, your pancreas is supposed to release insulin.
Insulin serves as a “key” to open your cells, to allow the glucose to enter -- and allow you to use the glucose for energy.
But with diabetes, this system does not work.
Several major things can go wrong – causing the onset of diabetes. Type 1 and type 2 diabetes are the most common forms of the disease, but there are also other kinds, such as gestational diabetes, which occurs during pregnancy, as well as other forms.
Blood Sugar Monitoring: When to Check and Why
Managing diabetes is one part investigation and two parts action. Unlike some other diseases that rely primarily on professional medical treatment, diabetes treatment requires active participation by the person who has it. Monitoring your blood sugar level on a regular basis and analyzing the results is believed by many to be a crucial part of the treatment equation.
When someone is first diagnosed with diabetes, he is usually given a blood sugar meter (or told to go buy one) and told how and when to use it, as well as what numbers to shoot for. However, the advice a person receives on when to monitor and what the results should be generally depend on his type of diabetes, age, and state of overall health. It can also depend on a health-care provider’s philosophy of care and which set of diabetes care guidelines he follows. At least three major health organizations have published slightly different recommendations regarding goals for blood sugar levels.
When someone is first diagnosed with diabetes, he is usually given a blood sugar meter (or told to go buy one) and told how and when to use it, as well as what numbers to shoot for. However, the advice a person receives on when to monitor and what the results should be generally depend on his type of diabetes, age, and state of overall health. It can also depend on a health-care provider’s philosophy of care and which set of diabetes care guidelines he follows. At least three major health organizations have published slightly different recommendations regarding goals for blood sugar levels.
Monitoring At Home.
Self-monitoring is an integral part of diabetes management because it puts you in charge. Regardless of how you manage your diabetes — through diet and exercise alone or combined with oral medicines or insulin — regular blood sugar monitoring provides immediate feedback on how your program is working.
Checking your blood glucose gives you the freedom to make choices without worry, the confidence to learn from your actions, and the motivation to keep striving to do better. Monitoring tells you that what you’re doing either is working or isn’t, and it serves as motivation to keep up actions that are working or to make changes.
The important thing is to know how to interpret the numbers and take the necessary action. For example, if you take insulin and your blood sugar is high, you may need to bolus, or take more rapid-acting insulin, to bring your levels down into range. If you manage your Type 2 diabetes with diet and exercise, you might treat high blood sugar with a walk around the block.
People who use insulin and certain oral diabetes drugs are also at risk of developing low blood sugar, or hypoglycemia, which needs to be treated promptly when it occurs. Regular monitoring may enable you to catch and treat it early, and any symptoms of hypoglycemia should be checked with a meter reading. Over time, blood sugar monitoring records can be analyzed for patterns of highs or lows that may suggest that a change is needed in the treatment regimen.
Checking your blood glucose gives you the freedom to make choices without worry, the confidence to learn from your actions, and the motivation to keep striving to do better. Monitoring tells you that what you’re doing either is working or isn’t, and it serves as motivation to keep up actions that are working or to make changes.
The important thing is to know how to interpret the numbers and take the necessary action. For example, if you take insulin and your blood sugar is high, you may need to bolus, or take more rapid-acting insulin, to bring your levels down into range. If you manage your Type 2 diabetes with diet and exercise, you might treat high blood sugar with a walk around the block.
People who use insulin and certain oral diabetes drugs are also at risk of developing low blood sugar, or hypoglycemia, which needs to be treated promptly when it occurs. Regular monitoring may enable you to catch and treat it early, and any symptoms of hypoglycemia should be checked with a meter reading. Over time, blood sugar monitoring records can be analyzed for patterns of highs or lows that may suggest that a change is needed in the treatment regimen.
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