type 1 diabetes Flashcards
description of the dysfunction
If you have type 1 diabetes, your pancreas doesn’t make insulin or makes very little insulin. Insulin helps blood sugar enter the cells in your body for use as energy.
Without insulin, blood sugar can’t get into cells and builds up in the bloodstream. High blood sugar is damaging to the body and causes many of the symptoms and complications of diabetes.
discription of symtoms
Feeling more thirsty than usual
Urinating a lot
Bed-wetting in children who have never wet the bed during the night
Feeling very hungry
Losing weight without trying
Feeling irritable or having other mood changes
Feeling tired and weak
Having blurry vision
modern treatment
Insulin cannot be taken in tablet form because it is digested in the alimentary canal. Hence, the only treatment is regular injections of insulin or the use of a programmable pump that provides a continuous supply of insulin under the skin.
traditional treatment
Type 1 diabetes, and sometimes type 2 diabetes, is treated by injections of insulin. The insulin for the treatment of diabetes used to be obtained from the pancreas of cows and pigs. This made supplies of insulin expensive and limited. The extracts had to be purified, and the patients sometimes suffered allergic reactions or infections from the animal-derived insulin.
can you cure type 1 diabetes
Insulin injections do not cure type 1 diabetes, they simply fulfill a role to ensure the body is able to function.
what makes the treatments user friendly
easy to use
easily maintained
self-applied treatment
low cost
no risk
risks of the treatments
The patient must have regular injections to stay alive, but even with injected insulin the long-term effects are likely to be kidney failure, heart attack, stroke, amputations, blindness or nerve damage.
ethical concerns related to the treatments
where the insulin is sourced from. Insulin used to be sourced from animal’s pancreas, if it still is, this could raise ethical concerns relating to both the patient and the animal’s wellbeing
whether the insulin being used is even safe for human consumption since it is coming from another animal which might contain all types of diseases and infections that could spread to the human
the ethical concerns relating to the animal since we are breeding these animals to kill them and use their pancreas simply is very cruel and holds ethical problems with breeding. Since using the pancreas of an already dead animal is unhygienic
where is insulin made
in the pancrease
What would the destruction of beta cells lead to?
type 1 diabetes
how would the beta cells be destroyed
immune cells called T lymphocytes attack and destroy insulin-secreting pancreatic beta cells and the pancreas stops producing insulin
what is hyperglycaemia
an abnormally high level if sugar in the blood. frequently found in people with diabetes mellitus
what is diabetes mellitus
a group of diseases, all of which result in an abnormally high level of glucose in the blood and the excretion of glucose in the urine. common name is diabetes
