Looking Deeper Into Diabetes

Millions of Americans today are suffering from diabetes.  With the number of people affected by diabetes seemingly increasing every year, all kinds of treatments have been explored to curb this.  A number of conventional medical treatments have been available, controlling the disease itself, as well as the possible complications that may arise.  Meanwhile other patients afflicted with the disease who have not found success with the conventional methods of treatment seek refuge by trying CAM or complementary and alternative medicine therapies, like using herbs like American ginseng. Most onlookers express a bit of doubt whether these therapies are really as effective as the conventional methods, and if they are safe in the first place.  Let us look into these alternative solutions one by one.

But before looking into them, let’s first look closer into what diabetes is.  Diabetes is a group of diseases and is usually classified into:

• Type 1 diabetes, which usually victimizes young people from children to people below 30 and makes up 5-10% of all diagnosed diabetes cases;

• Type 2 diabetes, which occurs mostly in older people and makes up a huge chunk of diabetes cases;

• Gestational diabetes, a kind of diabetes which can occur to pregnant women.

In a diabetic person, his or her body’s ability to turn food into energy is weakened.  In a normal body, food is broken down into glucose, which serves as fuel for cellular function.  However, diabetic bodies either do not produce enough insulin (a hormone that aids in glucose absorption in cells) or have cells that do not properly respond to insulin.  Glucose gets built up in the blood instead of getting into cells.  Blood with high glucose levels eventually wreak havoc on a number of the body’s organs, including the kidneys, eyes, skin, nerves and blood vessels.  In a good number of cases, patients with diabetes complain of always being tired even just after a short activity. Moreover, patients in the advanced stages of diabetes may result in blindness. This may also cause diabetic shock, which can kill a patient. 

It is thus essential for a diabetic to control his or her blood glucose, levels of cholesterol and blood pressure.  Diabetics usually experience the symptoms of fatigue, excessive thirst and hunger, sudden weight loss, and wounds or sores that take time to heal.   Treatments not classifiable in standard Western medical practice are called complementary and alternative medicine.   Some of the symptoms and the main cause of diabetes may actually be helped with the use of alternative medicine, the most popular of which are herbal cures. Among these medicines that have proven to be not only popular but also quite effective is American ginseng, which has been known to control the levels of blood sugar important in curing diabetes.