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In order to determine whether you've developed gestational diabetes during pregnancy, doctors may test your blood sugar level. The most common procedure is a glucose screening. Most women are tested between the 24th and 28th weeks of pregnancy, the time when the body is likely to begin having greater difficulty processing glucose. If you are at high risk, your doctor will likely test you much ear...

If you have diabetes, everything you eat and drink takes on extra importance. You have to ask yourself whether that bowl of pasta will boost your blood sugar, and naturally you wonder if you can get away with having a little dessert. You may also wonder if it's OK to drink alcohol. You probably won't find beer or wine on any official "diabetic menu," but if your diabetes is well-controlled, a dr...

If you have diabetes, a single drop of blood can speak volumes. When placed on a test strip and fed into a blood sugar meter, that little drop can tell you whether, at that moment, your sugar level is too high, too low, or just about right. You can also get an important glimpse into the future. If your blood sugar is too high for too long, you could be at risk for long-term complications such as ...

Nutrition may seem like a complicated business. But in the big picture, every diet has just three main pieces: fats, carbohydrates, and proteins. As a person with diabetes, you should know how to use these building blocks to help manage your disease and maintain your health. The three components Fat. Despite its unhealthy reputation, fat is a crucial part of a healthy diet. Fat provides a big dose...

Diabetes is a serious illness that requires close attention and daily treatment. If you're caring for an aging or ill relative or a child who has the disease, diabetes management may be one of your duties. You'll have to check that person's blood sugar levels and make sure he gets a healthy diet. And if he needs insulin shots, you'll have to learn how to use a needle. Injecting medicine can be a ...

Most people who look at a baked potato see -- well, a baked potato. But if you have diabetes, you might see a statistic -- nearly 40 grams of carbohydrates -- or a category: a member of the "starch" group. The question is, should you eat it? That baked potato may be a healthy addition to your meal, or it could be the item that sends your blood sugar soaring. If you have a meal plan, you'll know wh...

Is there a connection between diabetes and depression? Does diabetes cause depression? Or, does depression cause diabetes? Experts aren't sure, but they are certain about one thing: there is a link. In fact, up to 30 percent of people with diabetes also suffer from depression. This may come as little surprise to you if you're diabetic, since constantly watching your diet and checking your blood s...

If you have diabetes, carbohydrates can be the most confusing part of your menu. Carbs raise your blood sugar, but they also provide much-needed energy. Eating too many carbs can make you gain weight, but skimping on them means you miss out on the fiber and nutrients found in many carbohydrate-rich foods. To make things even more complicated, some carbohydrates raise blood sugar faster and higher ...

Many people with diabetes have to rethink their approach to eating. Often, that means a new approach in the kitchen, too. You can bring out great flavors in foods without adding a lot of fat, calories or salt. If your kitchen is a place where healthy menus go to die, it's time to try some new cooking tips. For starters, a diabetes-friendly kitchen doesn't come equipped with a deep-fat fryer. Dee...

Living with diabetes takes a lot of work: regular doctor visits, checking your blood sugar at home, taking your medications as prescribed, exercising regularly, and watching what you eat every day. If you've recently been diagnosed with the disease, you've probably discovered another challenge that few people ever talk about. Without some preparation, diabetes can drain you emotionally as well as ...

If you have diabetes, you're probably already committed to protecting your feet, your eyes, and your heart. But how much thought do you give to your teeth and gums? Dental problems are a serious and very common complication of diabetes. Without proper dental care, you could suffer pain and discomfort. You could even lose your teeth. Fortunately, everyone with diabetes can take steps to help preven...

If you have diabetes, you've already been through your share of ups and downs. Some days, you may feel like you're in complete control of your disease and your life. Other days, you may feel like the disease is calling the shots. At these times, simply checking your blood sugar or counting your carbohydrates can seem like a monumental task. Don't be surprised when you have an off day. It happens ...

Summary of American Diabetes Association recommendations Feel free to print out this checklist and take it with you when you see your doctor. It's a summary of recommendations that the American Diabetes Association has made to physicians regarding their patients with diabetes. The organization calls for:

As most people with diabetes know well, wildly fluctuating levels of sugar in the bloodstream can cause trouble. High levels of blood sugar, due to a lack of insulin or resistance to insulin, reflect the body's inability to transport sugar into its cells to be used as fuel. The cells literally begin starving to death -- a process that can lead to kidney disease, heart disease, chronic infections, ...

A small cut on a toe once sent Stella Anderson* to the emergency room. Most people would have just slapped a band-aid on the "injury" and forgotten about it. But most people don't have diabetes. Unlike people with normal blood sugar, diabetics need to examine their feet daily for the slightest injury. Since diabetes can cause neuropathy -- nerve death or damage -- a small cut could go undetected a...

As a person with diabetes, you probably already know that any food with carbohydrates can raise blood sugar. That includes organic brown rice as well as Twinkies. But your body handles different foods in different ways. A gram of carbs from one type of food can affect your blood sugar much differently than a gram from another will. Some nutritionists use the "glycemic index" to rate how a particu...

If you have diabetes, you undoubtedly spend a lot of time thinking about sugars and carbohydrates in your diet. But just like everyone else, you should be careful about fat, too. Too much fat can threaten your heart and make diabetes harder to control. But fats aren't all alike. While the fats in fried bacon and ice cream have earned their unhealthy reputation, other types of fat can actually be g...

Every person with diabetes should visit a doctor at least every three months. Regular checkups allow your doctor to track your condition and, if necessary, make changes in your treatment plan. But what should happen during those checkups? Do you wonder why your doctor orders certain tests? Or what the numbers mean? The American Diabetes Associations guidelines cover all aspects of diabetes care, i...

People with diabetes sometimes have a separate condition that keeps them from taking control of their health. It's called pride. Martha Lee Palotta, a registered dietitian and certified diabetes educator in Metairie, Louisiana, has seen this countless times over the years. "Many people think asking for help is a sign of weakness," she says. "But if a person is not willing to get the help they need...

For many people, nutrition labels are just part of food packaging. But if you have diabetes, those labels can be an important tool for managing your disease. You just have to know how to read them. One of the first things to look for is the "serving size" and, perhaps more important, "servings per container." This information -- usually found near the top, right underneath the words "Nutrition Fa...

Choosing healthy foods is an important step toward controlling diabetes. But healthy portions are important, too. Even the most nutritious, diabetes-friendly foods can cause trouble if you eat too much. Overeating can make both your blood sugar and your weight harder to manage. And if you're using food exchange lists to plan your meals, it's important to keep portion sizes in mind. In fact, many...

It's a New Year! Now's the perfect time to reflect on your past and make plans for the future. It's also the perfect time to recommit yourself to controlling your diabetes. Monitoring blood sugar, planning healthy meals, exercising, taking medications, and getting regular checkups shouldn't be just once-a-year resolutions. This year, make them a way of life. Here's how to tackle diabetes, this yea...

Diabetes is a slow, steady illness that can turn serious very quickly. If you have diabetes, you should prepare yourself for a diabetic emergency. In a way, you're like a person living on a fault line who plans ahead for an earthquake. But you have an advantage: Instead of just preparing for a possible disaster, you can take steps to prevent it. Your doctor can tell you if you are at risk for a di...

Are sugar substitutes a good choice for people with diabetes? Sugar substitutes or artificial sweeteners such as aspartame (NutraSweet) or sucralose (Splenda) can be healthy choices for anyone wanting to cut back on sugar and calories -- and that includes people with diabetes. By themselves, most sugar substitutes are "free foods" that won't raise your blood sugar or load you up with calories. "S...

By the latest estimate of the American Diabetes Association, 23.6 million Americans have diabetes. If that's the case, why do so many people with the disease feel so alone? For people with diabetes, it isn't always easy to get support. Your friends and family may not really understand the disease, and your doctor -- the person who knows your condition best -- may not give you as much time as you w...

In many cases, diabetes calls for a team effort. Different healthcare providers frequently tackle the disease together, often with amazing results. According to a report in Clinician Reviews, teamwork has been shown to shorten the length of hospital stays and can help keep patients from coming back to the hospital. Patients who work with a healthcare team are also less likely than patients who see...

Eager to return home from a business trip last November, Christa Laszczkowski was first in line to board the plane. In the atmosphere of heightened security following September 11, she wasn't alarmed when her luggage was randomly selected for inspection at the gate -- not until screeners began to manhandle her diabetes supplies. "Of the four screeners there, only one of them even knew what diabete...

Healthy eating is all about balance. The right types of foods in the right amounts can help anyone to control weight while lowering the risk of chronic diseases. Balance is especially important if you have diabetes. Proper proportions of carbohydrates, proteins, and other nutrients can help you manage your condition and avoid complications. One simple way to balance your diet is to balance your p...

One night while watching a play in a dark theater, Paula Lewis saw something terrifying: A fuzzy spot dancing in front of her eyes. She tried to tell herself it was a dustball, but she knew it was really a cloud of blood. Lewis had diabetes, a disease that can damage the blood vessels in the retina. Now one of her vessels had burst, and she worried that blindness wouldn't be far behind. But Lewis ...

Can watching my diet help me control my diabetes? Yes. The foods you choose and the timing of your meals can make a big difference in how well you manage your condition, so it's a good idea to work out a plan with your doctor and a dietitian. The main goal will be to avoid fluctuations in the level of sugar, or glucose, in your blood. You'll also need to keep your weight under control and hold dow...

People with diabetes try hard to keep their blood sugar from getting too high, but sometimes they succeed too well. Certain diabetes medications -- including insulin injections and pills such as chlorpropamide (Diabinese) -- can sometimes make blood sugar too low, a condition called hypoglycemia. People with diabetes can also get low blood sugar simply by skimping at mealtime, drinking too much al...

Sugar gets most of the attention, but people with diabetes need to think about salt, too. Too much sodium -- the mineral in salt -- can raise your blood pressure, and high blood pressure can threaten both your heart and your kidneys. Simply having diabetes also puts these organs at risk, and you don't want high blood pressure to add to the danger. The American Diabetes Association recommends eatin...

Believe it or not, there's an all-natural product that can control blood sugar and help people with diabetes live long, active lives. It's a naturally occurring hormone, not a drug. It's called insulin. If you have type 1 diabetes, your body doesn't make insulin, and so you need regular injections of the hormone to maintain proper blood sugar levels. But is insulin the best nature can do? If you ...

Every time Delaine Wright climbs a mountain or goes speed skating, sugar pills are part of her equipment. Wright, who lives in Wakefield, Rhode Island, is a certified diabetes educator, an exercise physiologist, and a self-proclaimed "exercise nut" who happens to have type 1 diabetes. In addition to climbing and skating, she likes to work out on a trampoline and, just to keep things interesting, s...

If a poor diet can help usher in type 2 diabetes, here's some good news: a healthy high-fiber diet can help keep it under control. In the last few decades, researchers have gotten a fix on what role specific foods might play in the development of type 2 diabetes. A six-year study reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that women who ate a high-sugar, low-fiber diet -- i...

Type 2 diabetes used to be rare, the kind of disease that doctors saw only once in a long while. Today, diabetes afflicts over 20 million Americans -- an increase of roughly 14 percent in just the past few years -- and almost everyone knows at least one person who has it. But that doesn't mean it's well understood by most people. One out of three people with type 2 diabetes isn't aware that they h...

Can children get type 2 diabetes? Type 2 diabetes used to be practically unheard of in people under 30. That explains the other common name for the disease: adult-onset diabetes. Not long ago, almost all children with diabetes suffered from the type 1 form of the disease, which means their bodies couldn't produce enough insulin. And type 2 diabetes, in which the pancreas may produce normal insulin...

Children with diabetes usually have what is called type 1 diabetes, one form of the disease known as diabetes mellitus. It's an autoimmune disease, which means the body's own immune system, designed to attack infectious agents invading from outside, instead attacks cells that perform a healthy, normal body function. In type 1 diabetes, essential cells of the pancreas are destroyed. Normally, these...

For most of the more than 25 years I've had type 1 diabetes, I've been at the mercy of a syringe. Up to four times a day, sick or well, working or on vacation, my body demanded insulin, and I gave myself an injection. Everything was planned around those four shots, including when and what I ate. Injections had to be made at about the same time each day, which meant that any change in my schedule a...

I'm told it was the beginning of a lovely New England day, that morning some years ago when I woke up in a hospital bed. There was an odd, terrifying sensation of not really being there; the sinking realization that I was, truly, there. The news, wafting in from some far-off doctor, was that I had experienced a seizure and broken both shoulders. I recall thinking foggily that this explanation fit ...

Once upon a time not so long ago, in a land very close to home, children faced bleak prospects when it came to learning about and coping with type 1 diabetes. Stern lectures from clinicians and educators, do's and don'ts imposed by parents, secrecy borne of fear that peers would shun them. By comparison, eating spinach or visiting the dentist was a breeze. Today, however, high-tech tools make kids...

What is diabetic neuropathy? Some diseases consume the body like wildfire. Others are more like a slow burn. Diabetes is a malady that takes its time. If not controlled, diabetes slowly eats away at the body's cells, especially nerve cells. Doctors call the gradual breakdown of nerve cells "neuropathy." At first, nobody misses a few dead cells here and there. But after a decade or two, the damage...

When she worked as a journalist in Palo Alto, Loren Stein, then 44, never gave much thought to diabetes. "My image of a diabetic was someone who ate a ton of sugar and was really overweight," she says. "I never put myself in that category." Stein got a wake-up call during a routine checkup. Her fasting blood sugar level was 119 milligrams of glucose per deciliter of blood, significantly higher th...

If you believe the movies, pregnancy and diabetes don't mix. Just look what happened to Julia Roberts in the tearjerker Steel Magnolias. Because she had diabetes, her doctor urged her to not get pregnant. She ignored his warnings and died of kidney failure. Time for the audience to start sobbing. Of course, movies aren't the best source of medical information. If Steel Magnolias had been true to l...

Giving a 6-year-old a shot of insulin every morning is hard. Putting her on a school bus afterwards is even harder. Every weekday, Mary Schuh (pronounced "shoe") of Beaver Creek, Oregon, entrusts her daughter's life to the staff of Beaver Creek Elementary. Before Sarah Schuh started first grade, nobody at the school knew much about diabetes. Now her teacher knows exactly how many carbohydrates ar...

Sending your child off to school on her first day can cause separation anxiety in even the most level-headed of parents. Sending off a child with diabetes can be downright frightening. Will the school know what to do if your child becomes hypoglycemic? Will other students make fun of your child for having to go to the nurse's office? Will your child eat her snacks and lunch at the right times? The...

Long before he was able to compete himself, Gary Hall Jr., made his Olympic debut at age 21 months on the shoulders of his father. After qualifying for his third Olympic team in 1976, Gary Hall Sr. triumphantly hoisted the toddler high above his head. The senior Hall, now a Phoenix, Arizona-based eye surgeon, wrapped up his Olympic swim career that year with two silvers and a bronze medal. Twenty...

Fat can show up in all sorts of places. It can strain the seat of a pair of jeans, hang over a belt, or make a wedding ring nearly impossible to remove. In these thin-conscious times, many people worry about every extra ripple and bulge, no matter where it shows up. Doctors, however, see things differently. When it comes to your health, there's one place where fat is especially dangerous. Fat aro...

When a diabetic comes down with the flu or a bad cold, diabetes care often takes a backseat. Who can be bothered to check blood sugar when just getting out of bed seems like a chore? And who wants to follow a meal plan when it's hard to keep food down? As difficult as it may seem, you actually need to pay more attention to your diabetes when you aren't feeling well. Common illnesses such as a cold...

The members of your healthcare team know what it takes to control diabetes. Now it's your turn to become an expert, too. Here's a list of some of the most important questions you can ask. Remember that you may not get all your questions answered in a single visit, so you may want to bring up your most pressing questions first. It's also a good idea to establish a good working relationship with you...