Low plasma concentrations of vitamin C are associated with adverse changes in the microcirculation, peripheral arteries, and ventricular repolarization in young people with Type 1 diabetes, Swedish researchers report.

Enhanced oxidative stress plays a key role in the development of vascular complications in Type 1 diabetes. It has been suggested that antioxidants such as vitamin C may protect against cardiovascular disease (CVD) by reducing this process.

Petru Liuba (Lund University Hospital, Sweden) and co-workers investigated the relation between plasma concentrations of vitamin C and changes in vascular function and structure and myocardial repolarization in a cohort of young patients with Type 1 diabetes.

The 59 participants, recruited from a diabetes outpatient clinic, were aged 10 to 22 years and had a mean duration of diabetes of 9 years. Patients with a family history of major CVD risk factors other than diabetes were excluded.

Carotid artery intima-media thickness (IMT) was measured using ultrasound, cutaneous microvascular function with a laser Doppler multifiber probe during transdermal iontophoresis of acetylcholine and sodium nitroprusside, and duration of the QTc interval (ventricular repolarization) by electrocardiogram.

Plasma vitamin C was analyzed by high performance liquid chromatography with coulometric detection and the patients were grouped into three plasma vitamin C tertiles: low (14.0 to 49.0 µmol/l), middle (above 49.0 to 84.0 µmol/l), and high (above 84.0 to 119 µmol/l).

Writing in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, the authors report that carotid IMT was significantly greater in the lowest vitamin C tertile compared with the highest.

The cutaneous microvascular response to acetylcholine was significantly lower in the lowest tertile group than in the highest tertile group, but there was no difference in the response to sodium nitroprusside between vitamin C tertiles.

The QTc interval was significantly greater in the lowest vitamin C tertile than in the highest. Prolongation of the QTc interval is a significant predictor of adverse cardiovascular prognosis in patients with Type 1 diabetes.

Differences in all measures remained significant after adjustment for baseline variables.

“Poor vitamin C status is associated with increased carotid artery IMT, decreased microvascular function, and delayed myocardial repolarization in young patients with Type 1 diabetes,” conclude the authors.

“Large-scale prospective studies are needed to confirm these results and to clarify the underlying mechanisms,” they add.

MedWire (www.medwire-news.md) is an independent clinical news service provided by Current Medicine Group, a part of Springer Science+Business Media. © Current Medicine Group Ltd; 2009

Free abstract

Diabetes is a chronic medical disorder. It is a lifelong disease and may prove to be life threatening, if not treated properly. It is estimated that more than 20 million people are suffering from this chronic ailment in United States of America alone.

Don’t you think this figure is alarming? But even more alarming is that around 6 million of these diabetics are ignorant of their medical status. Yes this is the truth! The reason behind this figure is that signs of diabetes are so harmless that sufferer can remain unaware, that he is experiencing diabetic symptoms, for a longtime.

You can stay away from the same situation by having the thorough knowledge of the below mentioned 8 warning signs of diabetes. These diabetic symptoms will enable you to diagnose your medical condition and treat them timely.

Which Diabetic Symptoms A Person Must Look For?

Frequency Of Urination:   A person must note the frequency of urination. If the blood sugar levels are raised, it increases the flow of blood towards the kidneys. This is true that many people start to experience the problem of increased frequency of urination with their age. Sometimes diabetic write off this increased urination as they are getting older. If diabetes is underlying cause it must be treated; as if left undiagnosed and untreated it can result in kidney failure.

Excessive Hunger:   If the body runs short of insulin it gives a signal to the brain that it is hungry. This diabetic symptom is mainly experienced if the body experiences a lack of insulin from the blood towards the cells.

Unexplained or Sudden Weight Loss:  If the body is not receiving enough energy at the cellular level, it begins to break down the fat and muscle mass for replacing the deficiency of energy. The result is unexplained and sudden loss of  weight.

Fatigue:  Feeling tired and run down is caused again by the deficiency of energy at cellular level; as the cells are unable to use the provided insulin in blood efficiently.

Blurriness in Vision:   Blurriness in Vision is also experienced as one of the warning signs of diabetes as more and more blood flow towards the retina of eye which results in the swelling of eye lens.

Numbness and Tingling In Hands and Fingers:  If the diabetes is left untreated it may lead to numbness and tingling sensation in hands and fingers.

Irritability and Depression:  Irritability, depression and mood swings are experienced because of the all above warning signs of diabetes the body is experiencing.

Sometimes we just take it for granted when we have an instance of blurred vision. Being very busy as we are, we tend to dismiss such episode as maybe due to eye strain arising from spending too much time in front of the television or the computer. For adults, one should not rule out the emergence of diabetes when confronted with this episode. Diabetes is a very common but grave metabolic disorder that people generally take very lightly.

Many people who take diabetes lightly are not aware of the complications that diabetes can cause to a person. If you study carefully the complications, you will find that damage to the blood vessel is the main starting point for the complications. As the complications involve various important organs, people tend to equate these with the specific organs but actually it mainly involves the blood vessel. If diabetes is not properly controlled, gradually it will damage the eyes, kidneys, heart and the limbs. Aside the damage to the blood vessels, diabetes can also cause havoc to the nerves.

The diabetic complication that involves vision initially presents itself as blurred vision. This is a critical stage because the high blood sugar levels will cause the fluid to be drawn out from the eye cells. When this happens, the lenses will be affected and thus vision becomes blurred,.

With further attack by diabetes, the blood vessels nourishing the retina becomes affected.? When you have a long term damage to these blood vessels, diabetic retinopathy develops resulting in blindness. In such cases about 2% of the people inflicted become blind after 15years of diabetes while about 10% of these diabetics live with severe visual impairment.

It is thus very critical for everyone to be aware of the complications of diabetes, and an early detection and control of this metabolic disorder will save?lives.

Diabetes management has a lot of layers, and it can be overwhelming. Exercising with diabetes may be one of the hardest things to start, because your diabetes can actually get in the way of some of your exercise. However, it’s also one of the most important things for you to do to stay healthy. Here are some tips for getting started.

Unfortunately, having diabetes can put some constraints on what exercises you can do. The first step is to talk to your doctor or diabetes educator about what kinds of exercises are best for you. They can let you know what exercises will be best for you based on the condition of your heart, blood vessels, eyes, kidneys, feet and nervous system.

Once you know what activities you can do, make a list of the ones that work best with your lifestyle, and then plan where they will fit into your life. Start working those activities into your life gradually, but make sure they are at least somewhat challenging even as you work yourself up to the activities.

It’s important to check your blood glucose levels before and after exercise, especially in the beginning. Track how your glucose levels respond to exercise. Being aware of this can help you to avoid blood sugar highs and lows. You should be aware that exercise can make high blood glucose go higher, so it may not be a good idea to exercise if your blood sugar is above 300. On the other hand, if levels are normal or low, physical activity can make them go lower either while you exercise or shortly after. Make sure to adjust by eating a snack before you exercise if this happens to you. Make sure to get your blood glucose levels up before you exercise if they are below 70. Talk to your diabetes educator or doctor about the best ways to make sure that you’re ready to exercise on a glucose level.

Make sure that you have plenty of water with you when you exercise, and take snacks - carbohydrates - with you (especially if you’re going out of your house) so that you can cope with low blood glucose quickly if you need to. It’s also a good idea to wear your medical ID tag with you in case of an emergency.

Above all, make sure to track your progress. Being motivated to deal with all of this can be difficult, but if you can find ways to see how much it’s helping, it will make it easier for you to stay consistent.

When you receive the Seal you become conscious of how much you weigh and make an effort to lose extra weight. Now that is more crucial than ever since new studies link obesity, diabetes, and cancer. Four new studies show a link between obesity, diabetes, and cancer. And the link between diabetes and excess weight is already well known–extra weight puts you at greater risk to develop diabetes.

When you have diabetes, your need for insulin affects how likely you are to get cancer. But it is different for men and women. If you are a woman your risk of getting some kinds of cancer increases with insulin use.The information from these studies was released Friday December 7 2007 at the Annual International Conference on the Frontiers of Cancer Prevention Research which is held by the American Association for Cancer Research.

The results did not surprise scientists, who have thought along similar lines. Diabetics use a lot of insulin which along with other hormonal factors, increases cell production so more cells grow, including cancerous cells. The first study was done by the University of Minnesota, and those results showed that women with diabetes have a 50 percent greater chance of developing colorectal cancer.

The researchers tracked over 45,000 women who were taking part in breast cancer detection programs for over 8 years. Though they did not conclude exactly what is causing the increased risk, insulin use is likely the culprit. That was what the second study concluded. Diabetic women have a 300 percent greater chance of developing breast cancer, and their use of large amounts of insulin is probably the reason.

The second study, from Yale University, looked at C-peptide, a marker of insulin production, for 8 years. It found that the upper third of high C-peptide levels were 200 percent more likely to die from breast cancer than the lowest third measured.

The third study was not as much about diabetes as about the weight gain that so often causes it. This study was done at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. It showed that when women are found to have invasive breast cancer they should not gain any weight, because if they do, they will be much more likely to die from the breast cancer.

Several thousand women in the study were classed according to the body mass index. Women in the obese class were 2.4 times more likely to die of breast cancer than women in the normal body mass class.

Fat tissue produces more estrogen, and estrogen grows cancer cells. So the women are at greater risk for cancer and dying of it whether they are diabetic or overweight, or both. And the results with the men? The men are fortunate compared to the women. Testosterone like estrogen grows more cancer cells. But insulin reduces the amount of testosterone in men, so their chances of prostate cancer when diabetic are significantly reduced.

When you are sealed, God shows you how to begin taking care of your body, and how to change your weight by eating less and eating healthier foods. And you will stay healthy because you change spiritually when you receive the Seal.

A reward system can help you manage your diabetes and control your blood sugars. The common a1c test for diabetics can and should be used to improve and reward blood sugar control. Most doctors recommend a1c tests for their diabetic patients every three months or so. This test represents the average blood glucose levels over the past two to three month period. It does so by measuring the amount of glycated hemoglobin, or glucose attached to cells in the blood. Higher amounts of glycated hemoglobin indicate higher blood sugar levels, while lesser amounts indicate lower blood sugar levels on average.

The test is not foolproof nor necessarily accurate. If there have been elevated highs and low drops in blood sugar levels that we would call uncontrolled, it could possibly give the same a1c result as good controlled levels. Nevertheless the a1c is a reliable test. The patient should know whether they have been controlling their blood sugars or not.

All things being equal, if the test results are higher than they should be, the doctor will likely urge their patient to lower their blood glucose levels. If the test results are good, the doctor will congratulate the patient and urge them to keep up the good work. This article suggests that in both cases, good or poor, the test results can be used to improve and/or reward blood sugar control.

Let’s start with the good results and the rewards. I am a firm believer in the reward system for good diabetes control. In the realm of weight control, for example, if a person needs to lose fifty pounds, they could establish a reward for every ten pounds they lose on the way there. A night at the movies might be a suitable reward. Then a larger reward when they reach the fifty pound target, maybe a weekend at the beach.

That’s the idea with rewarding a good a1c test result. Since a good result requires three months of diligent blood sugar control, the reward should be suited to the effort. It should be more than a night out at the movies, but a weekend vacation might well fit the bill. If you have kept your blood sugars controlled and your a1c is, say, below 6%, that is terrific. You should be rewarded.

Not only is the weekend vacation a reward for what you have done over the past months, but it spurs you to do well over the following months as well. So it serves not only as a reward but as a motivation for future performance.

Now let’s apply it to a poor or unsatisfactory a1c result. First, if it is better than the previous result, there should still be some reward for improvement, though not a vacation. Maybe a steak dinner at a nice restaurant would do. In any case, the weekend vacation reward for a good result should serve as a motivation to improve when the test result is poor.

One last thing: where does one get the money four times a year to take a weekend vacation? Why, save it up over the three months. Putting a little money in the bank each month in hope for a good a1c reward can only serve as a further motivation to achieve it!

It seems that the number of people getting inflicted with diabetes increases year by year. This is indeed an alarming phenomenon and if no one heeds the call to regulate and control diabetes, many people will be in a precariously unhealthy situation.

Diabetes knows no barrier and it can attack anyone irrespective of color, gender or age. Despite campaigns worldwide on the dangers of diabetes and the insistence of controlled sugar consumption, the occurrence of diabetes goes unabated.

There are many natural remedies to combat and eliminate diabetes but doctors sadly still go for the prescription pad to combat the disease. Imagine the effect of treating diabetes using, say,?an anti diabetic drug that has an increased risk of cardiovascular mortality as one of its side effects? How ironic.

Simply, it is what you consume that can cause diabetes. So we must be very selective in the type of foods that we take everyday. You have to practise wise eating. Only then will you be able to keep diabetes at bay. The range of food that you can eat without is enormous. You can consume, without restriction, any amount of fish, fowl, vegetables, and meat (with restraint). These foods can be prepared for feast fit for a king.

Enjoy your meals if you must but if you sort of having the symptoms below, then it is better that you go for a health screening to eliminate diabetes:

1 You have the tendency to urinate very frequently and you always feel hungry and thirsty.

2. You tend to lose weight very easily without any effort. Again you would feel lethargic and tires easily.

3. You will experience blurred vision

4. There is numbness and tingling sensation in your limbs

5. Your skin tends to be very dry and there is itchiness.

Blood glucose meter has gone a long way since it was first manufactured. The easier way to test using these tools is through accu-chek which is a brand of testing device that is manufactured by Roche Diagnostics. This will take the worry out of taking care of diabetes.

What does it consist of? The kit that looks like a cell phone consists of an electronic monitor. This measures the blood glucose through strips. It also has a lancet device that drives a needle through the outermost layer of the skin in the finger to obtain a tiny amount of blood pressed onto the strip in the electronic monitor.

Roche Diagnostics claims this prevents re-sticking that is painful. This company also declares that 90% of the diabetics find this lancet device to be the least painful. As you can see, since the first time the test is done is right, there is no unnecessary waste of strips

Due to the less retesting, one feels more confidence in the result. The test strip fills quickly with just a tiny drop of blood. This is done correctly on the first try by 97% of testers. There are integrity checks to spot and prevent invalid results.

This least painful lancing makes use of a technology that reduces the aching motion from side to side. In addition it also comes with a drum of six lancets that are preloaded. One does not have to handle the individual lancets. It also comes with nonslip rubber grips and six test sites on the body to choose.

What is in it for you? Here are the benefits made possible by the accu-check:

• The design is easy to hold with rubber grips.
• The result is as quick as five seconds.
• The size is small.
• There are four reminders to test which you can customize.
• It uses a 3-volt lithium coin cell battery that is easily available.
• The battery life is for 1000 tests.
• You can download a 500-value memory that could average the 7, 14 and 30-day readings.
• It is 3.7″ x 2″ x .9″ in size; 2.1 oz including the battery.
• It is well-suited with the data management tools of Accu-Chek.
• It is accepted by most healthcare plans that could be a saving to you.

This blood sugar monitoring system is fairly new in town. A leader in checking blood glucose levels, Roche Diagnostics has this kit that will cut the steps in half. It is designed to look like a mobile phone with all the tools needed in one device. I wish I were selling this because just writing about it makes me want to make a purchase. Hmm, perhaps someday.

The Accu-Chek Compact Plus is the only one of its kind with three solutions in one gadget. It has a lancing contraption that detaches, a test strip drum having 17 test strips and a meter which can display the test results brightly. Just push a button once and the strip comes up ready to use.

This makes it easier to do the test as it cuts the steps in half. It does away with the handling of the strips and is more hygienic with the simple and quick method. The user does not have to be concerned about accurate testing as the gadget self-codes. It takes only five seconds to test and the result is easy to read and it glows in the dark.

Another good point of this new monitoring system is that it needs only one hand to operate and is practically pain-free. It is available in diabetes clinics, pharmacies or from Roche itself. They will replace the present model as they run out in stores. Patient support will be provided through an Accu-Chek Customer Care Line for 365 days a year. This is indeed a good blood glucose meter.

The metabolic disorder of diabetes is one disease that can be cured through natural means without resorting to the administration of medications. All we need to do in order to prevent as well as eliminate diabetes is to pay very detailed attention to our food intake, as well as forcing ourselves to go for exercise at least three times weekly. In addition, take supplements to assist in the nourishment of body cells. What I commonly observed is that most people have a very poor understanding regarding the intake of fruits. For most, the intake of any fruits is safe and permissible at any time.

However, they do not take into consideration the quantity of sugar especially glucose that are found in fruits. Some diabetics would complain that despite taking medications as well as controlling the intake of sugar and carbohydrates, their blood sugar levels are not satisfactory. At most times it turned out that their choice of fruits was wrong from the start.

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I have had customers who complained that their diet control, though strict, did not bring down the blood sugar levels. When I screened their foods, I found out that there were some high glycaemic fruits which they regularly took without realizing the sugar contents.

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So my advice is that you should refrain from taking the following fruits on a regular basis or if possible, eliminate them from your diet:

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1. Watermelon which has about 70 percent glucose.

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2. Banana, melon, pineapple, fresh apricot, and raisins. These fruits contain 50 to 70 percent glucose.

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The following fruits which have a glucose content of less than 50 percent can be taken at any time:

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1. Apple is another good fruit and as the saying goes-an apple a day keeps the doctor away- aptly applies.

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2. Grapefruit: This has been found to lower the glucose level in a few days after intake and it is really good for diabetes.

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3. Other fruits include plum, pea, dried and orange.

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As a guide, if the fruit has a sweet taste, make sure that you only consume it moderately.

With more and more celebrities going in for Acai berry and it supplements more is the awareness of the product. Millions of people around the world have suddenly become aware of the Acai berry and are interested in the topic due to the great medical potential held by the fruit.

As awareness has increased, so too have the enquiries of the product. A common question made on Acai berry is that if it can be consumed by a diabetic person.?People suffering from the chronic disease called diabetes are and have to be really concerned about their life style and their diet. So it is quite natural for them to enquire if a particular fruit or its supplement is beneficial to them.

As per the research made by the medical studies the fruit Acai berry is quite safe for the diabetic person. Or to be more perfect it helps in alleviating the disease itself. But before availing this benefit the person consuming it has to be sure that the product is 100% natural preserving the natural elements of the fruit. It is so because the market is now flooded with artificial products and it has become difficult to distinguish them.

The product is available in many forms in the market from the pill form to the dried powder, from juiciest to smoothies, and not to forget mentioning the whole fruit form. If you go in for the juice form then be sure that you consume it with in 24 hours of its preparation.

You can get the supplement from the health care canters, grocery shops or from the chemist shop. It does not matter as long as you buy the supplement is prepared in such a way that they retain its natural nutrients like antioxidant, fiber content, vitamins, minerals, as is found that the market is being flooded with the artificial ones.?