Treating diabetes Flashcards
How do we treat people with type 1 diabetes?
People with type 1 diabetes need replacement insulin before meals. Insulin is a protein that would be digested in the stomach, so it is usually given as an injection or through an insulin pump to get it directly into the blood.
How does injecting insulin into type 1 diabetes patients help them?
Allows glucose to be taken into the body f the cells and converted into glycogen in the liver.
Stops the concentration of glucose in the blood from getting too high.
As blood glucose levels fall glycogen is converted back into glucose.
Blood glucose levels are kept stable.
What have doctors tried to do in order to cure type 1 diabetes?
- Can transplant a pancreas: difficult and risky, not enough pancreas donors available
- Transplant pancreatic that make insulin from both dead and living donors: limited success.
- Produce insulin-secreting cells from embryonic stem cells: Uses genetic engineering, for some people it is not ethically acceptable.
How is type 2 diabetes treated?
- Eating a balanced diet with carefully controlled amounts of carbohydrates.
- Losing weight.
- Doing regular exercise
If this doesn’t work there are drugs that: - Help insulin work better on the body cells
- Help the pancreas make more insulin
- Reduce the amount of glucose absorbed from the gut.
Why is type 2 diabetes becoming more common nowadays?
Type 2 diabetes usually affects older people but it is becoming more and more common in younger age groups, which may be associated with lifestyle risk factors such as diet, body weight, and exercise levels as genetic factors.
