What Sort Of Diet Should Children With Diabetes Eat
Diabetics can eat exactly the same food as normal people: it is a myth that they can only eat food with no sugar for instance. However, diet is an extremely important consideration for any diabetic, particularly young diabetics.
A dietician will be able to advise you further, but it is certainly essential that your child has a balanced and healthy diet, high in complex carbohydrates and fibre.
Although you will have to build your family meals around your diabetic relation, there is no reason why this has to be a problem. A healthy diet benefits anyone.
The quantities of food that your child can enjoy depend entirely on his or her size and age, and will be established by the dietician and parents.
It is up to both you and your child to understand how their body copes with different foods, avoiding the ones that are negative.
It is necessary to be careful with sweet food, but it need not be 100 per cent off the menu.
Faq: Frequently Asked Questions
What are the most common symptoms of type 1 diabetes?;
Regardless of age, the most common symptoms of T1D are excessive thirst, fatigue, headache, and frequent urination.Why do people with type 1 diabetes urinate so often?
When sugar accumulates in a persons bloodstream, their body acts quickly to get rid of it by making extra urine. Excess glucose also triggers thirst signals in the brain, which results in drinking more and having to go to the bathroom more as well.
Why are type 1 diabetes symptoms different in children and adults?For reasons that still arent totally clear, the onset of T1D is much slower in adults, often taking months for symptoms to fully manifest, whereas in children, it may only take days. High blood-sugar levels are present for longer in the bloodstream of adults, meaning that there is more opportunity for long-term damage to organs and bodily systems. For instance, untreated high blood-sugar over several months time can lead to nerve and kidney damage, which is a complication often found in adults who have recently received a type 1 diabetes diagnosis, but hardly ever in children.What happens if type 1 diabetes is left untreated?T1D symptoms, if left untreated, can lead to complications such as eye damage, kidney damage, nerve damage, heart disease, and osteoporosis. Luckily, by working with your endocrinologist to manage your blood sugar, you can avoid all of them.
Once The Diagnosis Has Been Made
Traditionally, most children with new onset type I diabetes, and particularly the youngest ones, have been hospitalized to stabilize their hyperglycemia and to provide the initial education of their families. In more recent years, there has been a trend away from hospitalization at diagnosis except under certain circumstances . The Hospital for Sick Children has found this to be no less true for infants and toddlers than for older children and teens. Indications for hospitalization include the severity of their condition at diagnosis , family living far from the hospital with difficulty attending on a daily basis, or if the responsible physician is not certain that the family understands the significance of the diagnosis or may be unlikely to attend the day care education program. The latter may be due to the presence of a language barrier or part of a severe emotional response to the diagnosis.
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How Long Can You Live With Diabetes Without Knowing
- Post author:Cameron Moore
How long can you live with diabetes without knowing? Around half a billion people in the world are living with diabetes. It is common for someone to have diabetes without even knowing it. In this article, Ill discuss how long you can go without knowing you have diabetes, as well as prevention tips.
How long can you go with having diabetes before knowing you have it?;If you have mild to moderate high blood sugar levels , you could live a long, full life. You could even live up to the normal life expectancy of age 70 to 80 years. The reason is that you wont likely notice or suffer from any symptoms with mild high blood sugar levels.
The problem with diabetes, however, is that it can gradually become worse. According to Diabetes UK, if your blood sugar levels keep rising, your life expectancy reduces by 10 to 20 years.
Read on to learn more about how long you can live with diabetes without knowing you have it, its symptoms, as well as some prevention tips.
What Should I Do If My Child’s Blood Sugar Level Is Too Low
Your child’s blood sugar level is too low if it goes below 70 mg/dL. If the level is too low, have your child eat or drink 15 grams of fast-acting carbohydrate. These are found naturally in fruits and dairy products. Fast-acting carbohydrates will raise your child’s blood sugar level quickly. Examples of 15 grams of fast-acting carbohydrate include:
- 4 ounces of fruit juice or 4 ounces of regular soda
- 2 tablespoons of raisins
- A tube of glucagon gel or 3 to 4 glucose tablets
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Diabetes Symptoms In Children
Chloe’s unquenchable thirst and frequent urination were classic signs of type 1 diabetes. “Yet even though I’m a doctor, I missed the symptoms in my own daughter,” Dr. Powell says.
Other symptoms including increased appetite, weight loss, lethargy, and irritability are easily dismissed as kid quirks or chalked up to growth spurts.
“Symptoms come on suddenly and can seem obvious after a child’s been diagnosed,” says Larry Deeb, M.D., past-president of the American Diabetes Association and director of Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare’s Diabetes Center, in Florida. “Parents often say their child wasn’t herself for weeks, but they couldn’t pinpoint why.”
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Although blood tests are the most reliable way to diagnose diabetes, your child’s doctor may first order a glucose urine test because it’s easier to have a kid pee into a cup than to draw her blood. If there’s sugar in her urine, a random blood-glucose test can confirm the diagnosis, usually while you’re still at the doctor’s office. A blood-glucose reading of 200 milligrams per deciliter or higher indicates your child has diabetes and will need to be given insulin multiple times every day to help her body process glucose.
Fortunately, there have been great advancements in managing this lifelong affliction.
Reduce Sugar And Refined Carbs Intake
A lot of studies have shown the correlation between high intake of sugar or refined carbs and diabetes. Therefore, it is better to replace these food types with foods that have lesser effects on blood sugar.
An analysis done on 37 studies also revealed that people who have the highest intake of carbs have a 40 percent chance of developing diabetes than those with the lowest carb intake.
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Measure Your Waist Circumference
The risk of developing type 2 diabetes is higher if fat is stored around the abdomen . BMI assessments do not take into account where fat is stored. Men with a waist circumference of 102 cm or more and women with a waist circumference of 88 cm or more are at higher risk. Measure after breathing out . This is not the same as the waist size on your pants.
What Causes Bedwetting In Children
Nighttime wetting is often related to slow physical development, a family history of bedwetting, or making too much urine at night. In many cases, there is more than one cause. Children almost never wet the bed on purposeand most children who wet the bed are physically and emotionally normal.
Sometimes a health condition can lead to bedwetting, such as diabetes or constipation.
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The Stages Of Type 1 Diabetes
My daughter Bisi was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes three years ago at the age of six. The first night after she was diagnosed, once she finally fell asleep in her hospital bed, tossing and turning despite the IV in her arm, I remember standing outside in the hall with my husband and a couple of medical residents, talking with them about her diagnosis. Could this have been coming on for a while? we asked them. I described how for a couple of years, Bisi had been almost unbearably cranky when she was hungryto the point where Id asked her pediatrician more than once if something might be wrong. No, the residents told us. Type 1 diabetes comes on very suddenly, in a matter of weeks, as the bodys beta cells suddenly die out under attack from the immune system. Every doctor or nurse we spoke with during the three days in the hospital , echoed what the two residents, fresh from medical school, told us.
But it turns out they were wrong.
Insel explained that stage 1 is when people test positive for multiple pancreatic islet auto-antibodiesmeaning that the immune system has begun to attack the pancreas. In stage 2, people start processing glucose differently. While people in stage 2 are not yet experiencing the classic signs of type 1 diabetes , if given a glucose-tolerance test, their blood sugar would rise more than normal. Their A1C might also start rising above normal. (The paper explaining all this in scientific terms is:
Type 2 Diabetes In Children
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For decades, type 2 diabetes was considered an adults-only condition. In fact, type 2 diabetes was once called adult-onset diabetes. But what was once a disease mainly faced by adults is becoming more common in children.
Type 2 diabetes is a chronic condition that affects how the body metabolizes sugar, also known as glucose.
Between 2014 and 2015, about 24 percent of new diabetes diagnoses in children were type 2 diabetes.
Read on to learn the symptoms of type 2 diabetes in children and what you can do about it.
Symptoms of type 2 diabetes arent always easy to spot. In most cases, the disease develops gradually, making the symptoms hard to detect. Many people dont feel any symptoms. In other cases, children may not show any.
If you believe your child has diabetes, keep an eye out for these six symptoms:
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Sign : Changes In Eyesight
A high blood glucose level causes fluid to be pulled from other body tissues, including eye lenses. This may lead to blurred vision or other eyesight problems. However, a young child may not complain to you about it.They dont know what normal is, the way adults would, says Clement. And some of them arent even reading yet.
Can Symptoms Appear Suddenly
In people with type 1 diabetes, the onset of symptoms can be very sudden, while in type 2 diabetes, they tend to come about more gradually, and sometimes there are no signs at all.;
Symptoms sometimes occur after a viral illness. In some cases, a person may reach the point of diabetic ketoacidosis before a type 1 diagnosis is made. DKA occurs when blood glucose is dangerously high and the body can’t get nutrients into the cells because of the absence of insulin. The body then breaks down muscle and fat for energy, causing an accumulation of ketones in the blood and urine. Symptoms of DKA include a fruity odor on the breath, heavy, taxed breathing and vomiting. If left untreated, DKA can result in stupor, unconsciousness, and even death.
People who have symptomsof type 1 or of DKAshould contact their health care provider immediately for an accurate diagnosis. Keep in mind that these symptoms could signal other problems, too.
Some people with type 1 have a “honeymoon” period, a brief remission of symptoms while the pancreas is still secreting some insulin. The honeymoon phase usually occurs after someone has started taking insulin. A honeymoon can last as little as a week or even up to a year. But its important to know that the absence of symptoms doesn’t mean the diabetes is gone. The pancreas will eventually be unable to secrete insulin, and, if untreated, the symptoms will return.
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Can Type 1 Diabetes Can Be Diagnosed With A Single Finger Stick Blood Glucose Test
Type 1 diabetes can be diagnosed with a single finger- stick blood glucose test if the proper technique is followed. Scrupulously clean hands washed and thoroughly dried. The diagnostic criteria for diabetes in adults and children is a random sample blood glucose concentration over 11.1 mmol/L. If the symptoms are suggestive of diabetes then this must be ruled out. Children and young people should NOT wait for fasting blood glucose tests. The finger sticks capillary test will be confirmed with a lab test of the blood glucose once the child arrives at the hospital.
A child or young people with a high blood glucose level should be referred promptly on the same day to secondary care.
What Causes Diabetes In Toddlers
The cause or causes of diabetes in children and toddlers is unknown. However, experts have formed some theories and have identified risk factors for both types of diabetes:
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Type 1 diabetes. This type of diabetes usually occurs in people whose immune system, which usually fights viruses and harmful bacteria, destroys the insulin-producing cells in the pancreas. Although why this happens is not well understood, experts believe that genetics or environmental factors, like exposure to viruses that trigger this autoimmune response, could be responsible.
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Type 2 diabetes. Type 2 diabetes is more common in adultsâthe risk increases with ageâbut it can appear in children. This kind of diabetes has links to family history and genetics, but a sedentary lifestyle and excess fat, especially in the belly area, can also play a role.
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Might I Have Diabetes And Not Realise
With type 1 diabetes, the body stops producing insulin, meaning the effect on the body is usually rapid and noticeable. However, type 2 diabetes develops slowly – the body still produces insulin, but it may be insufficient, or the body might not respond to it properly. This means that the development of symptoms is gradual. “Symptoms for type 1 diabetes often develop very fast,” explains Macciochi. “But with type 2 diabetes you may not even know you have it, as symptoms can be very subtle.”
What Happens In Diabetes
Our bodies break down the foods we eat into glucose and other nutrients we need, which are then absorbed into the bloodstream from the gastrointestinal tract. The glucose level in the blood rises after a meal and triggers the pancreas to make the hormone insulin and release it into the bloodstream. But in people with diabetes, the body either can’t make or can’t respond to insulin properly.
Insulin works like a key that opens the doors to cells and lets the glucose in. Without insulin, glucose can’t get into the cells and so it stays in the bloodstream. As a result, the level of sugar in the blood remains higher than normal. High blood sugar levels are a problem because they can cause a number of health problems.
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What Is Type 1 Diabetes
The two types of diabetes are type 1 and type 2. Both make blood sugar levels higher than normal but they do so in different ways.
In type 1 diabetes, the pancreas loses its ability to make insulin because the body’s;immune system attacks and destroys the cells that produce insulin. No one knows exactly why this happens, but scientists think it has something to do with genes. But just getting the genes for diabetes isn’t usually enough. A person probably would then have to be exposed to something else like a virus to get type 1 diabetes.
In type 2 diabetes, the pancreas still makes insulin but the body doesn’t respond to it normally. Glucose is less able to enter the cells and do its job of supplying energy . This raises the blood sugar level, so the pancreas works hard to make even more insulin. Eventually, this strain can make the pancreas unable to produce enough insulin to keep blood sugar levels normal.
Use Water As Your Main Beverage
A 24-week study revealed that obese adults , who drank water instead of their regular diet sodas, showed a reduction in fasting blood sugar, insulin levels, and insulation resistance. Only drinking water helps avoid consuming beverages with high levels of sugar, preservatives, and other harmful ingredients.
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Sign : Diabetic Ketoacidosis
DKA can happen in a child with undiagnosed diabetes and is a medical emergency. As the body runs out of insulin for breaking down glucose, it starts to burn fat for energy instead. This leads to a buildup of acidic byproducts called ketones. DKA changes the pH of your blood and is a very dangerous condition, notes Clement.
Signs your child is in crisis can include vomiting, stomach pain, fast breathing, flushed face, fruity breath odour and fatigue. DKA may progress very quickly and can be fatal. But its also preventable. The more that parents, teachers and camp counsellors are aware of the early signs of diabetes in children, the more likely it is that DKA can be averted.
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In England Diabetes Occurs In 1 In Every 450 Children
In England diabetes occurs in 1 in every 450 children. 97% of children with diabetes have type 1 diabetes mellitus. Type 2 diabetes in children is still uncommon.
Nearly 30% of newly diagnosed children have had at least one related medical visit before diagnosis. Doctors and parents are missing the early signs.
Doctors may fail to ask about frequent urination and excessive drinking Adolescents may ignore the symptoms.
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