If you are diagnosed with diabetes, you are not alone. The WHO estimates that 120-140 million people suffer from diabetes worldwide. Thanks to genetics, unhealthy eating habits, improper nutrition, lack of exercise and a sedentary lifestyle.

Diabetes: The dreaded disease

Most of the food you eat is turned into glucose (simplified sugar) so that it can be transformed in to energy for various activities. The pancreas, an organ that lies near the stomach, makes a hormone, insulin to help glucose enter the cells of your body. Glucose is the basic fuel for the cells in the body, and insulin takes the glucose from the blood into the cells. When you have diabetes, your body either does not produce enough insulin, or cannot use the insulin produced as well as it should. This causes the glucose to accumulate in your blood and not get used.

There are two types of diabetes. Type I diabetes, often called as Juvenile Onset Diabetes, is usually diagnosed in children or young adults. The problem is that they simply don’t produce insulin on their own.
Those suffering from the more common Type II diabetes, also known as adult onset Diabetes, produce insulin, but are unable to produce enough or utilize what is produced.

Consequences

Left untreated, diabetes can cause serious complications including heart disease, blindness, kidney failure, poor circulation to limbs and lower extremity amputations. Diabetes is the seventh leading cause of death in the United States.