Diabetes is a disease that occurs when your blood glucose goes beyond its limit. The body produces insulin to help the glucose from the food get into your cells so that it can be used for energy. But sometimes, the body doesn’t make enough insulin, which keeps the glucose within the blood itself. Having too much glucose in your blood can cause diabetes as well as many other health problems. Remember, whether your diabetes value is too high, or it is only on the border, every condition and case of diabetes is serious!
India and diabetes
Almost 10% of Indians are suffering from diabetes today; and can you believe it, around one in every two Indians living with diabetes is unaware of their condition! Moreover, only half of those who realize that they have diabetes are able to manage their condition and bring it under control. This means that only 25% of diabetics in India are able to cure, or at the least, maintain their condition!
Variation in health system performance for managing diabetes among states in India – The study
This number of 25 has been brought up only after a good amount of survey and research done. It was a cross-sectional study of individuals aged 15 to 50 years, which was conducted by the PHFI, MDRF, and the Harvard School of Public Health, along with other international organizations. They used secondary data from the National Family Health Survey 2015-16 for the analysis, and concluded what has been mentioned above.
How can diabetes be identified?
Developed countries have their citizens undertake regular health checkups to monitor all their diseases, which even include non-communicable ones. We need to adopt this approach in India too, which will help monitor blood glucose levels, and thus keep a check on diabetes. Otherwise, in India, we only undergo a checkup when a health certificate is required; which is a very wrong practice. This clearly shows that we aren’t undergoing health checkups for our own sake, but only for the sake of clearing a document that can help us achieve something that we may want; like a visa, a job, or the like.
Diabetes is a silent disease, which is why one may not be able to realize that they are suffering from it. But, if you really want to keep a check, you will have to undergo routine health checkups and look for even the slightest symptoms so that they can be treated immediately and more effectively, before they reach a higher stage.
The future of diabetes in India
With the way that India is growing its diabetic population year after year, it seems like it will become the diabetes capital of the world in the next few years! In fact, the International Diabetes Federation has also estimated that by 2045, India will have more than 130 million diabetic patients across the country!
How can diabetes be treated?
Diabetes may, if left untreated, develop harmful cases like kidney problems, which may require transplant or dialysis. While this is a huge problem for the patients themselves, another fact is that we don’t have enough donors for the transplant as well. Moreover, the dialysis may cost at least Rs. 3 lakhs every year, which is almost unaffordable by a major percentage of Indians.
Diabetes can be of two types – one in which the body stops making insulin at all; and the other in which the body cells cannot use blood sugar efficiently for energy. While both these types of diabetes can be controlled with the help of dietary changes and exercise, the first type will require insulin, while the second type will require non-insulin medications. How all of this is found and implied, is all thanks to the hardworking clinical researchers and scientists. You can also become one of these highly esteemed individuals by undertaking professional online clinical research training from a reputed institute like Avigna Clinical Research Institute.
