Hyperglycemia & Hypoglycemia

Diabetes Mellitus is a disease in which your body produces less or no insulin, or the insulin being produced by your body is not effective to be utilized. Insulin is important as it facilitates the entry of glucose in to cells. Glucose is the usable form of sugar in our body and it is essential as energy-source of cells. Because glucose in not utilized by the cells, it remains in the blood stream causing a rise in the amount of glucose in the blood which we call hyperglycemia.

My mom is a diabetes, and she is taking insulin. She used to have episodes of sudden weakness, feeling cold and other discomforts. Since she was scared of consulting a doctor, we didn't now the reason of her weird symptoms until I studied Diabetes back in college (BS Nursing course). She was actually having hypoglycemia.

Early signs of hyperglycemia in diabetes include:

• Increased thirst
• Headaches
• Difficulty concentrating
• Blurred vision
• Frequent urination
• Fatigue (weak, tired feeling)
• Weight loss
• Blood sugar more than 180 mg/dL
• 
  

Prolonged hyperglycemia in diabetes may result in:

• Vaginal and skin infections
• Slow-healing cuts and sores
• Decreased vision
• Nerve damage causing painful cold or insensitive feet, loss of hair on the lower extremities, and/or erectile dysfunction
• Stomach and intestinal problems such as chronic constipation or diarrhea

Here are the symptoms of hypoglycemia:

• hunger
• shakiness
• nervousness
• sweating
• dizziness or light-headedness
• sleepiness
• confusion
• difficulty speaking
• anxiety
• weakness

Hypoglycemia can also happen during sleep. Some signs of hypoglycemia during sleep include

• crying out or having nightmares
• finding pajamas or sheets damp from perspiration
• feeling tired, irritable, or confused after waking up

Back in college we were taught a rhyme inorder to easily differentiate hyperglycemia and hypoglycemia.

HYPERGLYCEMIA:

hot & dry - sugar is high!

HYPOGLYCEMIA

cold and clamy - needs candy!

So easy to memorize. It's just a short rhyme but it can help save lives! And maybe somewhere out there it already did!