Diabetes selfcare , insights for common man

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Most of you are aware regarding diabetes very well. My target audience is general community so there may be oversimplifications.
We know that glucose is an important fuel for our body. Without glucose we cannot survive for long. Excess of anything is bad.

Diabetes is excess glucose in your blood.
How to suspect that you may have diabetes?
1.Remember three P
-Polydipsia-excessive thirst and you drink excessive water
-Polyphagia-excessive hunger and you take more food
-Polyuria-excessive urination
2.You have frequent infections in urinary tract
3.You have frequent chest infections
4.Your wound healing takes longer time

How to make sure yourself that you have diabetes?
After your dinner before 10 P.M. don’t take anything except water and in the morning go to your nearest clinical lab and give your blood sample for Fasting Blood Sugar. In your report if its value is greater than or equal to 126 mg/dl you should repeat it one more day, if it is still more than or equal to 126 mg/dl, you have diabetes. Here one thing everyone should know. When we give our sample to lab generally our sample is tested by GOD POD method which takes sometime in reporting. Apart from this some lab for convenience do this test by ready made strips with glucometer. When you get your report, you should check with lab that whether your blood sugar has been checked with GOD POD method or by glucometer strips. Here one thing I want to make clear that there is a chance for false high blood sugar result by strip method and you may be falsely labeled as diabetic.

Further your blood sugar checked by fasting blood sugar or random blood sugar only give you a snapshot value of your blood sugar at that time. There may be many causes of your temporary rise in blood sugar about which we would discuss later.
What you should do if you get two consecutive Fasting Blood Sugar equal to or greater than 126 mg/dl in your lab report?

If it is done by GOD POD method and your value is above 126 mg/dl you should get your blood tested to confirm that you had average blood sugar level was high for the last three month. For this ask your lab to test your HbA1C.If in that report your value is greater than 6.5,your can say that your average blood sugar was high in the last 3 months. One very important point, if you are taking corticosteroids for allergy, asthma, arthritis etc. .for long time, your blood sugar as well as blood pressure would be high and it may return to normal if you stop those medicine. Such medicine should not be stopped abruptly, rather such medicine should we gradually tailed off(slowly reducing the dose to lower level over a period of 5 to 7 days then stop).
It is not necessary that the corticosteroids can be found in allopathic medicines only. Beware of ads which claim to cure your asthma or long chronic pains by herbal or Ayurveda preparations particularly in the developing countries where drug control is very poor, because such preparation may contain steroids or be careful of ads relating muscle building formulas because they may contain anabolic steroids. In my opinion you should take the advice of a qualified medical practitioner before going to opt for such preparations. Even if you should take such treatment under doctor’s supervision only.
If you are confirmed that you have diabetes by your blood sugar test and HbA1c test and you have excluded that you are not getting any form of steroids in any form of medication, what should be your next step…..
If you can consult a diabetologist..so much so good!
If you cannot afford to go to doctor by any reason you should know, what else you can do!

1.Increase your glucose consumption by doing exercise, walking, cycling, swimming, gardening, washing your clothes manually, sweeping your house, mopping your house etc. These actions would keep you healthy and off course wealthy. Send all your servants to their native places forever and do all your household work on your own. I am amazed why people go to gym and pay money for their workouts. They burn candles from both sides. You can have plenty of works in your home in which you can cover all your exercise and at the end of exercise your all the work would be done, their all the things would be in place. It is only you who can do your work in the best possible way. Believe me after following my advice you would shed pounds and you would save pounds. So the first principle to keep control on your sugar is burning your glucose by manual activities.

2.Second principle is to spread your food intake evenly in a day. In other words just break your three major meals into six small snacks .Suppose you take usually four chapatis in your breakfast at 8 A.M., four chapatis in your lunch at 1.P.M. and four chapatis in dinner at 9 P.M.
In that case you should take early morning snack at 7A.M.,second morning snack at 10 A.M., third snack at 1 P.M., Fourth snack at 4. P.M., fifth snack at 7 P.M. and sixth snack at 10 P.M.t wo chapatis in every snack.
This spreading your daily total calorie intake from three major meals to six small snacks would maintain your caloric requirement of body and would avoid episodes of high blood sugar.
The gist is don’t eat too much at once rather eat small quantities more frequently.
3.Selection of food is also important. You should avoid direct sugar, glucose because they would be very quickly go to your blood within five minutes of your intake and your blood sugar would rise very fast. Mind it, you have to take those things which would increase your blood sugar slowly. It is a better idea to incorporate sprouts of gram, wheat germs, salads in your snacks because these contains complex carbohydrates and increase your sugar level slowly, apart from this these are rich in dietary fiber which relieves many ailments.
4.You can choose some well known plant products with little or no risk of side effects.
Mostly diabetes occurs in two types. One in which there a chemical called insulin (which is made in your body in an organ called pancreas) is deficient.
Just imagine a building which is made up of bricks, similarly our body is made up of cells. To survive every cell need energy. For energy every cell require glucose as fuel. When we eat carbohydrates like cereals food, it gets digested in our intestines and converted into glucose. From intestine the glucose enters in our blood circulation which is maintained by a pump called heart. Blood functions as distributor of nutrients to all the cells of our body. So the glucose is distributed to every cell of our body. But glucose entry inside the cell is done by insulin. So without insulin the glucose can not enter the cell and it remains in blood and blood glucose level rises .So one type of diabetes which is due to less insulin production is called Type 1 diabetes or Insulin Dependent Diabetes Mellitus IDDM.
Another type of diabetes in which insulin is not deficient, but the glucose entry inside the cell is not occurring because cell are not responding to insulin. This is called Type 2 diabetes or Non IDDM. 

Imagine a scenario, blood is a carrier which is carrying glucose and an agent insulin which lifts the glucose and knocks the door of the cell. Cell opens the door and takes up the glucose. If the agent is less or absent it will not knock the door of the cell and the cell will not open the door and take up the glucose, so the glucose level will rise in the blood. This happens in type1 diabetes or IDDM. The agent Insulin is less.
Similar scenario in which the insulin or agent is adequate and it is knocking the door of the cells but cell is not opening the door so not taking up glucose this is type-2 diabetes.
In pregnant ladies body is getting ready to nurse the developing baby in the mothers womb, there is a chemical called prolactin which helps in milk secretion. If this chemical is formed in the mother, this may also give rise to diabetes.(gestational diabetes)
If you are heavy drinker and your pancreas gets damaged by over alcohol intake, you may get diabetes.
If your own steroid production in a glands( which are attached above your kidneys called adrenal gland)is excessive, you may get diabetes.
If you have lung cancer or any other tumor in the body which produces steroids, you may have diabetes.
If your thyroid gland is excessively releasing its hormone ,you may get diabetes.
So the ultimate treatment of diabetes is dependent on causes but in many cases no cause is identified.

So for self care my outlined approach ,let me repeat…..
1.Increase your physical activity
2.Break your Three major meals to six minor snacks.
3.Avoid simple sugar, glucose to avoid fast rise in your blood sugar
4.You can take artificial sweetener(be careful about that, some sweetener may prove dangerous in long term use.

5.safe plant products like raw bitter gourd juice, black plum/Jamun seeds powder, methi, ghormar leaves etc. My advice is that, try to arrange any of these things on your own, don’t rely on the ready made products.

6.One important point to note that, many of you believe that taking tea without sugar would not increase your blood sugar ,here I want to clarify you that tea,coffee and cocoa all can alone increase your blood sugar by decreasing phosphodiesterase and increasing cyclic AMP and finally increasing blood sugar(you don’t need to remember the names)bad news for all guys who believe that taking tea without sugar will not increase their sugar level in blood their belief is not right.
7.If your blood sugar is not controlled with diet, exercise and herbs, you can go for Oral hypoglycemic agents OHA this is sophisticated name of oral use tablets to control blood sugar. Here a lot of options you have(acarbose,glimeperide,metformin,glibenclamide,gliclazide,pioglitazone,rosiglitazone,rapeglenide etc.) but you are advised to take OHA on your Doctor’s advice only. When you have taken any of these OHA you are advised to take some sweet lozenges or glucose with you so that you can take those when your blood sugar falls. In my opinion most person with diabetes die due to low sugar caused by excessive medication and over control of sugar intake. REMEMBER ONE THING HIGH SUGAR IS NOT SO DANGEROUS FOR YOU BUT LESS SUGAR MAY TAKE YOUR LIFE WITHIN MINUTES,SO THE GOLDEN RULE IS KEEP THE BLOOD SUGAR HIGHER RATHER THAN DANGEROUSLY LOW.
How can any one know that his blood sugar is getting down and he should take some sugar

1.excessive sweating

2.increased heartbeat

3.cold hands or feet
4.giddiness or altered consciousness

Apart from OHA, insulin of many types e.g. Regular,50:50,30:70,glargine can be used only under your doctor’s advice.

DONT EVER TRY OHA OR INSULIN YOURSELF,           THESE MAY KILL YOU!    MIND IT!
If in your area there is no lab in your neighboring place, you can do self monitoring of your blood sugar with your glucometer, but Its reading is frequently 10-20mg/dl over GOD POD method. you should calibrate your glucometer by giving one time your blood sample to a standard pathos-lab to test your blood sugar by GOD POD and from the same sample you test with your glucometer, compare the results and keep the correction factor of your glucometer in your mind. whenever you test your blood sugar by your that glucometer in your home, correct your figure by correction factor you got in calibration to assess your actual blood sugar level.

Apart from this you can purchase Uris tix to know your urinary sugar in home. Roughly glucose comes in urine only when its level is more than 170mg/dl, if your urine is positive for sugar ,it means your blood sugar is roughly above 170mg/dl. If Uris tix is costly, you can purchase Benedict reagent prepared from science lab shops a test tube and a test tube holder. Just fill 5ml of Benedict reagent in a test tube and to it add 6 to 8 drops of urine and heat it for 5 minutes, take care the boiling fluid should not be spilled over your body part keep it away from your face. You will see change in color from blue to green to yellow to orange to red to brick red deposits. If color is no change or green…no sugar, yellow +
Orange++
Red+++
Brick red deposits++++
That’s all thank you!