In order to prevent the disease, it is necessary to know the main symptoms of diabetes. Diabetes mellitus is a chronic endocrine disease caused by absolute or partial insufficiency of insulin, or tissue insensitivity to this hormone.
Often this disease is also called the "silent killer. "Statistics show that approximately 50% of patients are unaware of their problem and continue to lead a normal life, while sugar slowly destroys their body.
According to the World Health Organization, this disease closes the top three among all diseases, after cardiovascular and oncological pathology. According to their forecasts, the number of patients will double every 15 years.
All this testifies to the need for correct, and most importantly, timely diagnosis and adequate treatment of the disease. Everyone should know the first symptoms of diabetes mellitus in the modern world and be ready to start therapy.
Early signs of illness
Let's look in detail, what can be the symptoms of diabetes? Like any other pathological process, diabetes has an early phase with very extensive symptoms, a peak period and an end stage.
In order not to bring the case to an unfavorable ending, it is necessary to suspect the presence of the disease in time and consult a doctor. The very first symptoms of diabetes like to disguise themselves as common cold infections.
These include:
- Constant fatigue and desire to sleep.
- Frequent episodes of urination, urinary incontinence, nighttime urination.
- A significant decrease in body weight for no apparent reason.
- Long healing time for small wounds, cuts.
- Decreased sexual activity in men, problems of premature ejaculation.
- Hunger, which is difficult to satisfy with the usual portions of food, which occurs even without any physical exertion.
- Deterioration in the quality of vision, blurring and double vision.
- Mild tingling in the tips of the fingers or toes. Violations of small movements and tactile sensitivity.
- Thirst in diabetes and desire to drink plenty of fluids. The daily volume of moisture consumed can exceed 3-4 liters.
- Urinary and genital tract infections in women.
As you can see, these symptoms are very non-specific and are often attributed to hard work, stress, or a cold. But if they began to develop in a person, then the best solution would be to consult a doctor and take a blood test for sugar and glycated hemoglobin>.
Symptoms of the disease in minors
The first symptoms of diabetes mellitus in children in most cases coincide with those in adults. However, there are nuances that you need to know for a timely diagnosis.
The first "bells" for children from 7 years old can be:
- Polydipsia or intense thirst. The child, even during normal physical activity, constantly wants to drink.
- Urinary incontinence during sleep in cases where this has not occurred before.
- A significant drop in body weight with an adequate diet.
- Frequent episodes of nausea and vomiting.
- Problems at school, poor performance, mood swings, aggressiveness.
- Increased skin bacterial diseases (furunculosis, carbuncles, barley and others), constant itching.
- During puberty, girls may develop thrush or other bacterial lesions.
The problem is that parents ignore such signs in their children, which often leads to the occurrence of hyperglycemic coma and the development of pronounced complications that are difficult to treat.
It is important to be able to suspect diabetes also in very young children. They are not able to tell what worries them, but mom or dad needs to be able to understand their child.
The first symptoms of hyperglycemia in infants may be the following phenomena:
- If there is an excellent appetite, the child is poorly or does not gain weight at all.
- The constant restlessness of the baby, which passes only after he drinks.
- The occurrence of diaper rash in the groin area, which appear more often than usual and are not amenable to standard treatment.
- A special condition of diapers after the drying of children's urine - they become as if starched.
- Perhaps the formation of sticky spots on surfaces where the urine of the baby has got.
- With the acute development of the disease, vomiting, diarrhea, and dehydration of the body may appear sharply.
The ability to suspect illness is critical. Unfortunately, ordinary people sometimes do not fully understand the seriousness of the first signs of diabetes. Due to such an incorrect attitude towards oneself and one's health, more than half of the cases of establishing the correct diagnosis fall on terminal states - hyperglycemic coma.
Its symptoms are:
- loss of consciousness of the patient;
- dry skin;
- drop in blood pressure and increased heart rate;
- characteristic smell of acetone from the mouth.
In the presence of such a picture, the patient requires immediate hospitalization with adequate drug therapy with insulin.
It is to prevent the occurrence of such conditions and diseases in general, every citizen should know the first signs and symptoms of diabetes.