HEALTH MATTERS

RGN, clinical lead for diabetes at NHS Eastern Cheshire CCG DIABETES is a serious, lifelong condition where your blood glucose level is too high.

There are two main types, Type1 and Type 2.

What all types of diabetes have in common is that they cause people to have too much glucose (sugar) in their blood. But we all need some glucose. It’s what gives us our energy.

We get glucose when our bodies break down the carbohydrates that we eat or drink. And that glucose is released into our blood.

We also need a hormone called insulin which allows the glucose in our blood to enter our cells and fuel our bodies.

If you don’t have diabetes, your pancreas senses when glucose has entered your bloodstream and releases the right amount of insulin, so the glucose can get into your cells.

But if you have diabetes, this system doesn’t work.

When you’ve got Type 1 diabetes, you can’t make any insulin at all.

If you’ve got Type 2 diabetes, it’s a bit different.

The insulin you make either can’t work effectively, or you can’t produce enough of it.

In both types of diabetes, because glucose can’t get into your cells, it begins to build up in your blood and too much glucose in your blood causes a lot of different problems.

To begin with it leads to diabetes symptoms, like having to wee a lot and being incredibly thirsty.

You may also lose weight, get infections like thrush or suffer from slow healing wounds.

Over a long period of time, high glucose levels in your blood can seriously damage your heart, your eyes, your feet and your kidneys.

But did you know that you can prevent or delay lots of these problems?

If you are concerned you may be at risk you should make an appointment with your practice nurse or GP who will arrange blood tests.

If you are found to be at risk of diabetes you can be referred to the National Diabetes Prevention Programme.

If you would like to know your risk score you can check on Diabetes UK’s website riskscore. diabetes.org.uk/start.

Keeping blood sugar, blood pressure and blood fats under control will hugely help to reduce your risk of developing complications.

With the right treatment and care, people can live a healthy life.

If you would like to find out more about diabetes visit nhs.uk/conditions/ diabetes.