Living with diabetes at four years old

Jan 23, 2017 News

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– over 60 percent of persons seen had high blood sugar during Linden outreach

Little Sophia Charles looks like any other four year old.
Bu what separates her from many children her age is the fact that Sophia was recently diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, after her mother, Angela Charles, decided to have her blood sugar level checked.
Charles said that she took the opportunity to have Sophia’s blood sugar levels tested last Friday, as the child had been rapidly losing weight even though she did not exhibit any outward signs of ill health.
“I decided to bring her and have her sugar tested because she losing weight all the time.
As a baby she was big and fat, then all of a sudden, when she was about eighteen months, she just start dropping off (losing weight), but I never carry she for no test or nothing. “
The now perplexed mother said that only last year her husband was diagnosed as diabetic, and that since then she had become worried about her children-Sophia who was losing weight and her two sons who she said ‘never ketching deself’ .
According to medical sources, with Type 1 diabetes the body does not produce insulin. Some people may refer to this type as insulin-dependent diabetes, juvenile diabetes, or early-onset diabetes. People usually develop type 1 diabetes before their 40th year, often in early adulthood or teenage years.
Type 1 diabetes is nowhere near as common as type 2 diabetes. Approximately 10 percent of all diabetes cases are type 1.

Patients with type 1 diabetes will need to take insulin injections for the rest of their life. They must also ensure proper blood-glucose levels by carrying out regular blood tests and following a special diet.
Diabetes has been cited as one of the leading cause of deaths in Guyana. In 2015 there were 49,800 cases of diabetes in the country, according to statistics from the International Diabetics Federation (IDF) Guyana is one of the 24 countries of the IDF NAC region.
According to the IDF, 415 million people have diabetes in the world and more than 44.3 million people in the NAC Region. By 2040 this figure is expected to rise to some 60.5 million the IDF predicts.
Diabetes is a progressive chronic disease characterized by high levels of blood glucose. It is a major cause of blindness, kidney failure, lower limb amputation and other long-term health problems that have a significant impact on quality of life and increase the risk of premature death.

A WHO Global report on Diabetes last year, detailed that one in 12 inhabitants—some 62 million people—live with diabetes in the Americas and that the number of persons living with the disease has tripled since 1980, making it the fourth-leading cause of death in the hemisphere, following heart attacks, strokes and dementias
If current trends continue, experts estimate that nearly 110 million people in the region will have diabetes by 2040, the report said.
The WHO report added that the vast majority of people with diabetes suffer from type 2, which is closely linked to overweight and obesity as well as sedentary lifestyles. It further noted that In the Americas, more than 60% of the population is overweight or obese.
The rise of diabetes can be slowed through a combination of fiscal policies and legislation aimed at changing the environment in which people make lifestyle decisions, along with greater public awareness of the need to address the top risk factors for the disease, the report said. It urges that measures be taken to reduce consumption of unhealthy foods. Some of those measures would include increased taxes on sugary drinks and front-of-package labeling that alerts consumers to excessive fat, sugar and salt in processed foods.
The most common diabetes symptoms include frequent urination, intense thirst and hunger, weight gain, unusual weight loss, fatigue, cuts and bruises that do not heal, male sexual dysfunction, numbness and tingling in the hands and feet.
President of the Guyana Diabetic Association and Chair elect of the International Diabetes Federation, Glynis Alonzo Beaton, who led an outreach held at the Amelias Ward/Wisroc bus park in Linden, on Friday posited, “eyes on Diabetes- test to prevent” is an outreach to all the Regions where we do exhibitions, testing and also eye testing. We also have our specialist Dr Jacqueline Ricardo, an endocrinologist that will be talking with diabetics.”
Alonzo- Beaton said that she wanted to bring the outreach to Linden because it is her hometown.
She said that persons with blood sugar problems were given free insulin and glucometers. Alonzo Beaton said that the response from the public was excellent, with the team testing almost two hundred persons. Sixty percent of those tested had blood sugar ranging from 289 to over 600 which she posited was high.
Medical research states that if you have Type 1 diabetes and stick to a healthy diet, do adequate exercise, and take insulin, you can lead a normal life.
So life for little Sophia Charles will now mean having to take insulin every day, in order for her to stay healthy.
After her unusually high glucose reading on Friday Dr Ricardo, immediately prescribed insulin and other medications and recommended that those be taken daily.
Her tearful mother, Angela expressed apprehension as to how she would cope with managing her diabetic child.
“I don’t know how I will manage but I have to try”, she said.
President of the Youth arm of the Diabetic Association, Keziah Nestor said that to be diagnosed with type 1diabetes can be devastating to young people.
“Diabetes is not an ‘old person’ disease, and this four year old that was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes today, is living proof of that. This is an auto immune disease, it doesn’t matter what you eat or how you eat it, because it is auto immune, and it can’t be cured.”
 (Enid Joaquin)

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