Treatment may disarm long-term effects of Type I diabetes
Like a slowly ticking time bomb, people with Type I diabetes often face nerve and blood vessel damage over time, which can lead to heart disease, stroke, blindness or kidney failure. This type of diabetes strikes one in 300 people, generally before adulthood, and is traditionally treated with up to two insulin injections each day, diet control, routine monitoring and a visit to the doctor every three months.
But diabetic complications affecting the eyes, kidneys and possibly the nerves and heart don’t have to happen, say UW diabetes experts. As part of the largest Type I diabetes study ever conducted, UW Medical Center physicians and other experts found that intensive control of blood sugar levels can head off or slow down these complications.
The goal was to keep blood sugar levels as close to normal as possible. Volunteers tested their levels seven times a day, gave themselves three or more insulin injections daily or used an insulin pump, were monitored weekly at the medical center, and visited the doctor’s office once a month.
“The message to patients is that the closer their blood sugar levels are to normal, the lower their risk of developing serious complications from diabetes,” says UW Diabetes Care Center Director Jerry Palmer, the lead researcher for the Seattle and Vancouver, B.C., study sites. Nationwide, 1,400 people from 13 to 39 years of age volunteered at 29 centers in the U.S. and Canada.