How To Diagnose Diabetes

Diabetes is the seventh leading cause of death in developed countries. This disease can be triggered due to different causes and, depending on them, its prevention and diagnosis will be different. Therefore, to know how to diagnose diabetes, we must know what type it is and what its origin is.

Therefore, we will briefly explain what are the types of diabetes to better understand how the diagnosis works.

What is the diabetes?

Diabetes is a disease that occurs when the level of glucose in the blood is too high as a result of problems in its metabolism.

On the other hand, we must know the term insulin. Insulin is a hormone produced in the pancreas, an organ located in the abdominal cavity, which helps glucose from food to be taken up by the body’s cells to use it as an energy source.

On some occasions, the body is not able to produce enough or even cannot produce any insulin and therefore the glucose stays in the blood and does not reach the cells. At other times, the body does not use the hormone properly, and therefore glucose is not taken up by the cells either.

If this situation is prolonged , excess glucose in the blood can cause health problems characteristic of diabetes.

As we have seen, diabetes can be caused by different causes. That is why there are several types of this disease that we will see briefly below.

Type I diabetes

Type I diabetes occurs because the body is unable to produce insulin due to the immune system attacking and destroying the cells of the pancreas that produce it.

Usually, this diabetes diagnosed in children and young adults, but can occur at any age. However, later we will see in more detail how to diagnose type I diabetes.

Ultimately, this diabetes is autoimmune in nature and people who suffer from it must take insulin daily to survive.

Type II diabetes

Type II diabetes is also called non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus. In this case, the cells of the pancreas are not destroyed by the body itself.

What happens is that there is a resistance to insulin, therefore the cells of the body do not respond well to the secretion of insulin and the level of glucose in the blood increases.

It is usually associated with older ages, usually from the age of 40, but it is also diagnosed in children and adolescents with obesity. In this case, the treatment is based on a proper diet, avoiding sedentary life, sometimes with oral drugs and also, sometimes, with insulin.

Other types of diabetes

Apart from these two main types of diabetes, there are others that are temporary and less serious. These are:

• Gestational diabetes : known as pregnancy diabetes. It appears in pregnant women and disappears just after delivery.

• Altered basal glucose : it is a state prior to diabetes in which we cannot say that a person has diabetes but whose blood glucose level is not normal either. Many of these people can develop diabetes over time.

• Mody type diabetes : It is an inherited form of diabetes that tends to appear before the patient reaches 25 years of age. It is a very rare condition since it only represents between 1 and 5% of all cases of diabetes.

What are the tests to diagnose diabetes?

Most healthcare professionals use fasting plasma glucose or the A1C test to diagnose diabetes. In some cases, professionals may also order a random plasma glucose test. We will look at these techniques in more detail.

Fasting plasma glucose

This test consists of measuring glucose concentrations in the blood at a certain time. It is usually done in the morning and after a fast of at least 8 hours. These conditions are like this so that the results are more reliable.

A1C test

This technique, also known as the glycated hemoglobin test, involves performing a blood test that indicates the average levels of glucose in the blood over the past 3 months. When using this technique to diagnose diabetes, the doctor must take into account patient factors such as:

• Age
• Presence of anemia
• Other blood problems

Random plasma glucose test

Also known as a random blood glucose test, this test is used to diagnose diabetes when there are symptoms and they do not want to wait for the person to have an eight hour fast. An overnight fast is not necessary for this test, because it can be done at any time.

And to diagnose gestational diabetes?

Pregnant women can have the oral glucose resistance test, the oral glucose tolerance test, or both to diagnose diabetes in their pregnancy. These tests help professionals know how the body uses glucose.

• Oral glucose load test : a blood sample is taken one hour after drinking a sweet liquid that contains glucose. If the glucose level is 135-140, the fasting test may need to be repeated.

• Oral glucose tolerance test : This technique measures blood glucose after fasting for at least 8 hours. Fasting blood is measured first and then a liquid with glucose is drunk. The blood tests are then taken again every hour.

How do you know what type of diabetes it is?

Although the above tests are effective in diagnosing diabetes, they are unable to identify what type it is. It is difficult to establish whether it is type I or type II. As the treatment will depend on the type of diabetes it is, it is very important to differentiate them.

To find out if your diabetes is type I, you must look for certain antibodies. These antibodies attack healthy cells and tissues by mistake. Therefore, the presence of one or more of several types of diabetes-specific autoantibodies can be used to diagnose type I diabetes and rule out type II.