An Old Disease, but New Remedies.
Today, there are more than 120 million diabetics in the world, with 13 million in the United States. This tells us that one out of twenty Americans suffer from diabetes. With so many diabetics and the many serious complications connected to this health problem, scientists throughout the world have done much research to find preventive measures and treatments for diabetes. Their research has brought much progress with significant breakthroughs in the twentieth century.
Before Insulin
Diabetes has been a health problem since 1500B.C. Even then, there were medical descriptions of the problem. From ancient China and the Middle East, descriptions of symptoms of diabetes, of the flow of large amounts of urine in the human body, were discovered. The word ‘mellitus’, which means ‘sweetened’, was derived from Latin to give us the medical term of diabetes mellitus. The word ‘diabetes’, meaning ‘to flow through’ came from ancient Greece.
Even though diabetes has existed since ancient times, diabetics could only try to control their problem with only diet and exercise. It was only in 1921 that insulin was available to diabetics to treat their problem. To this day, this is possibly the greatest discovery in the control of diabetes. With insulin, many diabetics’ lives were saved. Great strides in progress on the management of the disease continues with the development of devices which allow diabetic patients to monitor their own blood sugar level at home, without the inconvenience of travelling to a doctor. A diabetic can check his own blood sugar level before and after exercising, after each meal or at any time of the day whenever he feels a need to confirm that his sugar level is at a safe level. Use a blood sugar testing device, a diabetic is better at managing his diabetes and has a better control of his health.
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Benefits of Good Diabetes Control
Benefit with better control of blood sugar level, a diabetic can delay the development of complications from the sickness. Delaying such diabetes complications which can be problems :
- Affecting the skin.
- Nerves.
- Kidneys.
- Feet.
- Eyes.
- Heart.
- blood vessels, can only be possible through maintaining a healthy blood sugar level.