Blood Glucose Control: What happens in Diabetics and non-Diabetics?
In non-diabetics, blood sugar is controlled via a feedback mechanism, which works like this:-
Food is eaten >>Blood sugar rises as food is digested>>Blood goes to the pituitary gland in the brain, which assesses the blood sugar level.
– If the level is too high >>the pituitary gland releases a ‘messenger’ that travels in the blood and tells the pancreas to release insulin>>The insulin brings down the blood sugar level.
– If the blood sugar level is too low>>the pituitary gland releases a ‘messenger’ that tells the liver to release energy in the form of glucagon>>This then raises the blood sugar level.
By releasing these messengers, the pituitary reacts to the blood sugar level until it is balanced. What happens in a diabetic?
Type 1 diabetes – If you’re diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes it means you have a genetic component whereby you can’t produce any of your own insulin. Type 1 diabetes is caused by the body’s immune system mistaking the insulin-producing beta cells (located in the islets of Langerhans in the pancreas) as something alien and destroying them. You must also remember that your body needs insulin to survive. If you go off your food, you cannot stop taking your insulin as you will become very unwell. So if you plan on losing weight by reducing what you eat, don’t make the mistake of thinking you won’t need insulin. If you want to lose weight, reduce your insulin to match your reduced intake of food, but don’t stop taking your medication.
Type 2 diabetes – If you are diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes it means that you can make your own insulin, but its effectiveness is compromised. Type 2 diabetes is associated with a bad diet, lack of exercise and generally having too much weight. There are some medical conditions and genetic factors (e.g. the ‘fat gene’) which indicate that such weight gain is down to certain metabolic factors, but it is estimated that about 80% of Type 2 diabetes is down to ‘less than ideal eating habits and excess weight.
When you are first diagnosed as having Type 2 diabetes, you are likely to have your diet reviewed and you may be put on pills to stabilize your blood sugar levels. It’s unlikely that you will be put on insulin, at least not initially, but that may come later. It appears that changes in society such as the increased access to highly-processed carbohydrates, as found in fast foods, and the greater choice we now have in supermarkets, which we tend to drive and not walk to, may have led to Type 2 becoming an ‘epidemic’ of our times.
