How Diabetes affects your body systems is the question of concern. Diabetes is the excess amount of sugar in your circulating blood, and body cells are deprived of sugar to carry out their normal cellular functions to produce energy. Due to this imbalance of sugar in blood and cells, your body systems are affected. High sugar levels also affect different body systems.
Furthermore, some systems are susceptible such as the brain as the human brain needs sugar all the time, any interruption in the sugar levels in the brain cells for five minutes can cause brain cells to die. So, it is necessary to keep a balance in sugar levels in the body. As far as high blood sugar is concerned, low sugar levels also cause different side effects, in medical terminologies low sugar level is known as hypoglycemia, and high sugar levels are called hyperglycemia.
Why do blood sugars remain in the circulating blood?
There are two main causes why sugar does not go from blood into body cells.
Insufficient production of insulin:
Insulin is a hormone made by special cells in the pancreas known as beta cells. The function of insulin is to pick up the sugar molecules from the blood and reach them to body cells. If there is less amount of insulin the sugar will not reach to cells. The treatment of this kind of diabetes needs artificial insulin in the form of insulin injection is needed.
Resistance at the cell surface:
Another reason is when there is enough insulin in the blood but the cell surface is lacking insulin receptors due to which sugar molecules are unable to enter the cell.
Symptoms of high blood sugar:(diabetes affects body systems)
High blood sugar is known as hyperglycemia in medical terminologies. Patients with high sugar levels will be presented with the following symptoms.
- Severe thrust
- Frequent urination
- Blurry vision
- Headache
- Sometimes patient suffers from a fever that does not go away with antibiotics
- Muscles and joint pains
Signs and symptoms of low blood sugars (hypoglycemia):
Low blood sugar is known as hypoglycemia Low blood sugar may be sometimes life-threatening for a patient. Following are the signs and symptoms of low blood sugar levels
Lethargy
Fatigue
Headache
Blurry vision
Fainting and unconsciousness, sometimes having fits or seizures.
How you come to know that you have high sugar levels or diabetes:
people suffer from different symptoms before confirmation of diabetes. Moreover, people with a family history must not ignore the following symptoms.
Excessive thrust.
Excessive urination
Eating more (want to eat again despite having a meal:
Feeling lethargic
Infections in the body:
diabetic patients are more prone to infections, such as tooth infections and genitourinary infections especially in females, bacteria become attracted toward sugar and make colonies which cause infections.
Forgetfulness. Due to low energy in brain cells patients with high sugar may forget things.
Body aches: Diabetes causes musculoskeletal problems such as body pains especially joint pains and joint swelling, and the sensation of pins and needles in arms and legs, it may be due to nerve damage called neuropathy.
Impact of diabetes on the heart:
When sugar levels are higher in the blood, the blood becomes thick or dense, due to which the heart needs more pressure to pump blood out of the heart. Furthermore, viscous or thick blood causes resistance in the blood vessels which again need extra pressure to move blood through the vessels again exerting pressure on the heart to pump blood with more pressure. There people with diabetes also develop high blood pressure.
Impact on the brain:
People with diabetes have high levels of circulating blood and brain cells do not get sugar from blood to make energy. Therefore diabetic patient always feels sleepy and lethargic and unable to concentrate in severe cases or very high blood sugar levels.
Effect of diabetes on the urinary system:
When the sugar levels in the blood become high, your kidneys try to expel the sugar through urine. That’s why people with diabetes pee more, which further leads to dehydration, due to which they feel thrust and drink more water. Furthermore, diabetic patients are at high risk of developing kidney stones as the urine is acidic, and also accumulation of oxalate crystals forms stones.
Impact of diabetes on the integumentary system:
The skin of most diabetic people is brittle and dry; the reason behind it is due to dehydration due to excessive urination.
Impact of diabetes on vision (ophthalmology): High sugar levels in the blood cause blood thickening and crystal in the retina which causes blurry vision and is called retinopathy.
Getting frequent infections: diabetic patients always complain of urinary tract infections and in females, virginal infections occur frequently, the reason behind this is the excretion of sugar in urine so bacteria become attracted and cause infection.
The psychological impact of diabetes on the patient:
Diabetes has an impact on the psychology of patients. Following are some reasons that impact the psychology of patients.
- Patients with diabetes may feel fear and become anxious all the time regarding the complications of diabetes, such as kidney failure, heart attack stroke amputations, etc.
- Patients with uncontrolled diabetes may not be able to become pregnant. Furthermore, have a fear that his genes might transfer to his/her children.
- Needs to be more cautious about diet as diabetic patient has strong cravings for sweets so patients need to have strong control over the cravings.
- Feels embarrassed in office times or long travels due to excessive urination and thrust.
What the complications are of uncontrolled blood sugars?
Following are the major complications of high blood sugar levels
Kidney failure and kidney stones
Diabetic foot (Foot amputation if injured and not heeled and leads to tissue death called narcosis
Heart attack/stroke
Nerve damage (neuropathy)
Skin ulcers not heeled lead to deep infected wounds
Conclusion:
So, diabetes affects the whole body systems of the patient. It affects patients physically as well as psychologically. Diabetic patients need to be very careful regarding diet, must be aware of complications, patient should know the symptoms of high blood sugars and low blood sugars. Furthermore, and must be in touch with your healthcare provider. Patients must take care of his/her diet. Moreover, not taking care of a diabetic diet puts the patients at greater risk for complications.
