Diabetes can have very serious consequences on your daily health. Complications linked to the disease can affect several organs (nerves, heart, arteries, eyes, feet, kidneys, or even teeth). Thus, in many countries, diabetes is the main cause of blindness. Fortunately, some treatments and precautions allow patients to live normally.
How can Diabetes Kill you?
Whether you have Type 1 or Type 2 diabetes, your disease puts you at high risk for complications. Blood sugar imbalances affect your body and can cause serious damage to cells and internal organs, and yes it can kill you eventually (if not properly managed).
Diabetes, if not taken care of properly, can damage your kidneys, lungs, eyes, and other internal organs. It is a fact that the wounds of diabetic patients heal much slower than a normal person.
The permanent increase of sugar in the blood, therefore, causes complications such as blindness, organ failure, and damage to the nerves of the legs.
Blood sugar can affect the arteries in the legs and the patient develops the risk of a heart attack. Diabetes is the number one cause of kidney failure. The disease can alter the lining of the kidneys, which can lead to albumin in the urine. Even letting protein pass through the urine can ultimately lead to kidney failure.
Diabetes alters the arteries with major risks for cardiovascular health. Although, there are no know factors that can be linked to causing diabetes but it is often associated with obesity, arterial hypertension, or even a sedentary lifestyle with the consequence of risks of atherosclerosis.
Also, when all the veins are affected, the arteries supplying blood to the heart are affected. When the large arteries are affected, the person is at risk of organ failure.
Among the chronic complications of diabetes are nerve problems. Indeed, excess sugar in the blood disrupts the nerves both in their function and in their structure. The person may develop insensitivity to heat, as well as to pain. If the nervous system is affected, the person may suffer from digestive disorders or bladder and heart problems. Damage to the nerves is also the major cause of complications in the feet and eyes.
If the small blood vessels carrying blood to the retina are damaged, this can create blurred vision, if they burst, will swell the retina and create deposits of material, inducing vision problems. And, in the most severe cases, if scar tissue forms, the retina can break off and that causes blindness.The feet of diabetic patients are fragile, especially when suffering from high blood sugar. Poorly treated wounds can lead to abscesses or even gangrene and require amputation.
Diabetes also develops infections and sufferers are more susceptible to skin and oral infections.
In addition to oral infections, diabetics can suffer from a dry mouth, a side effect of many anti-diabetic drugs, which can lead to the appearance of lesions on the gum, a yeast infection, or an ulcer in the mouth.
Women are more prone to urinary tract infections, vaginal infections, and vaginal dryness; while men suffer from erectile dysfunction. A possible lack of muscle tone is the side effect of certain drugs, which decreases sensitivity and therefore affects arousal during intercourse.
Joint complications are common in people with diabetes. Other complications are also possible such as shoulder-hand syndrome and other muscular ailments.
Smoking and high cholesterol, however, do not seem to influence the future of our mental capacities.
Researchers believe that diabetes and high blood pressure could make people more likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease.
These complications cannot stop an inevitable consequence of the disease. They happen because the blood sugar is too high for too long. A diabetic who treats himself well and keeps his blood sugar levels within the correct limits is hardly more at risk of such complications than anyone else.
