How Diabetes Can Affect Your Body
How Diabetes Can Affect Your Body
Diabetes is a very serious disease, and if left unattended and untreated, can have some pretty serious effects on your body. Obviously, there’s a formidable mental role at play in diabetes, learning how to cope with the diagnosis and adjusting your lifestyle, but the physical dangers are even more serious.
One of the most common negative effects of diabetes on the body is the effect it has on your legs and feet. This area of the body is particularly affected by diabetes in that the nerves can get severely damaged if your blood sugar remains too high.
This leads to greater chance of infection, pain, and in severe instances, amputation of the leg, foot, or toes. This can all lead to further mental stress, as well. To combat these effects, you need to keep your blood sugar low by avoiding foods that may raise it.
The damage caused by diabetes isn’t just limited to the feet. Your entire body, anywhere where blood flows through, can be seriously hurt by diabetes. The most dangerous effects to the body can be found in the heart and in the brain, where the increased levels of sugar flowing through can lead to higher risk of blood clots, heart attacks, seizures, and strokes.
All of these can be fatal, so it’s extremely important that you regulate your blood sugar effectively. Another serious body part that gets effected by diabetes is the eyes. The blood vessels in the back of your eye, known as the retina, can be cut up by the excess sugar.
This can lead to permanent and very serious vision loss, and should not be taken lightly. You may also be at higher risk of developing cataracts, which is a bit less serious, but dangerous nonetheless.
Due to these risks, it’s recommended that diabetics visit an eye doctor at least once a year, if not more often, to make sure you catch any damage before it’s too late. Additionally, your internal organs can be affected by diabetes.
Diabetes is the most common cause of kidney failure. Your kidneys are very important because they act as waste disposal for your blood, and without them, the waste will accumulate, often resulting in death.
While kidney transplants are an option, it’s not always guaranteed that you’ll find a kidney to match. Alternatively, you could undergo dialysis, but dialysis is usually costly and a very poor way to live.
