Everything you wanted to know about diabetes

Diabetes affects four million people in the UK, and more are diagnosed each year. But what is it and how is technology revolutionising the lives of those who have it?

Four million people in the UK live with diabetes and nearly a quarter of a million more are being diagnosed each year. Ninety per cent of those with diabetes have type 2 diabetes (T2D) and you’re more prone to it if you’re overweight, it runs in your family or you’re of south Asian or African descent. In T2D, the body doesn’t respond properly to insulin, the hormone produced in the pancreas that dispatches glucose from the food we eat to the cells of the body to be used for energy or stored as fat. T2D is treated by weight loss, lifestyle changes and oral drugs. Type 1 diabetes (T1D), which accounts for 10% of cases, can appear in childhood and is treated with injectable insulin. In T1D, the pancreas gradually stops making insulin for reasons that are still unclear but may be triggered by a viral illness.

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from Health & wellbeing | The Guardian http://ift.tt/21tD2z9
via health