Insulin

Any diabetic will tell you that the first thing they learned about after being diagnosed with diabetes was what that mysterious thing called “insulin” does. Indeed, like many other medical matters, it’s not until we are diagnosed with a specific problem, that we start to take an interest in a subject, learning the underlying causes, symptoms and ways of treating an illness. The same applies to diabetes and insulin. Until you, a member of your family or friend is diagnosed with diabetes, you would probably never have given insulin another thought.

In order to properly understand diabetes, it is crucial to understand insulin and how it is produced. In every normal body, the pancreas produces insulin, which is a hormone that is automatically released when we consume food. When we eat, our bodies break food down into compounds, one of which is glucose which is a critical source of energy.
Our bodies need glucose to do all the things that its needs to do - such as help us exercise, move our bodies, grow, repair ourselves and carry out other normal bodily functions. Before our cells can use actually glucose, it must move from the bloodstream into individual cells. Insulin allows this process to happen. Without insulin, we simply cannot derive the energy we would otherwise draw from our food. For people who suffer from diabetes this is precisely the problem – they can’t access the glucose because they lack or cannot use insulin. For instance for those people who suffer from Type 1 diabetes, their pancreas simply does not produce insulin at all, so they have to self-administer insulin when they eat meals so they can derive energy from food. For Type 2 diabetics, their pancreas does make insulin, but their bodies do not respond to it. Therefore, they too must take insulin in order to make use of the food they ingest. The goods news is that there are plenty of insulin products on the market that diabetics can use to circumvent the problem, thereby controlling their lives.