5 Things To Expect If You Have Gestational Diabetes

5 Things to Expect If You Have Gestational Diabetes

5 Things to Expect If You Have Gestational Diabetes
Pre-pregnancy I ran, lifted weights and maintained a healthy weight, so I didn't anticipate any physical problems or complications once I got pregnant. Fast forward a few months later and a diagnosis of gestational diabetes plunged me into an unfamiliar world. One of monitoring blood sugar levels, planning meals, writing down everything I ate and meeting with a diabetes counselor. At first it was scary, but armed with the knowledge my doctors gave me, I got through it.
So if you're scared going in for the glucose test or if you've just been diagnosed, I'm going to pass on the knowledge that helped me survive pregnancy with gestational diabetes:
First, a diagnosis of gestational diabetes isnt the same as Type I or Type II diabetes. Unlike Type I and Type II, gestational diabetes develops during pregnancy and resolves itself afterwards. In the rare cases that it doesnt go away, the mom likely had undiagnosed Type I or Type II diabetes pre-pregnancy.
Babies born to mothers who either didn't receive treatment or didn't follow their doctor's guidelines have the risk of being born with "birth trauma, shoulder dystocia (shoulders impacted at delivery), high birth weight and in serious casesin-utero fetal death," says OB-GYN, Dr. Alixandra Creapeau. The good news is that so much is known about gestational diabetes and how to treat it that if you do follow your Doctor's orders the risks drop significantly.
2. You won't necessarily have to give yourself insulin shots
When youre diagnosed with diabetes, your mind may immedia Continue reading

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Girls with early first periods become women with greater risk of gestational diabetes

Girls with early first periods become women with greater risk of gestational diabetes
In Western societies, average age of first period has dropped from 17 to 13 years over the past century. justanotherhuman/flickr , CC BY-NC-SA
Girls with early first periods become women with greater risk of gestational diabetes
Professor of Life Course Epidemiology, Faculty of Medicine, The University of Queensland
The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
As a young girl, getting your period for the first time is a big deal. It comes with mental and social expectations around becoming a woman and a host of cultural practices that act to celebrate or stigmatise menstruation.
But evidence now suggests the timing of this event could also have health implications for girls who get their first period earlier than their peers.
During puberty our bodies change and sexually mature, and a girls first period is an important point in this process. The age when girls get their first period varies, however younger than 12 years is generally considered to be early. The possibility that a first period before the age of 12 is linked with pregnancy health was explored in our recent study . We found that girls who had early first periods were more likely to develop diabetes when they later became pregnant as an adult.
Gestational diabetes is a serious pregnancy complication , as it increases the risk of pre-term labour Continue reading

Mass. General Hospital launches phase II trial of BCG vaccine to reverse type 1 diabetes

Mass. General Hospital launches phase II trial of BCG vaccine to reverse type 1 diabetes
FDA approval of trial testing generic vaccine announced at ADA Scientific Sessions
A phase II clinical trial testing the ability of the generic vaccine bacillus Calmette-Gurin (BCG) to reverse advanced type 1 diabetes has received approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The approval of this trial, which will shortly begin enrolling qualified patients, was announced today at the 75th Scientific Sessions of the American Diabetes Association (ADA) by Denise Faustman, MD, PhD, director of the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) Immunobiology Laboratory and principal investigator of the study.
The five-year trial will investigate whether repeat BCG vaccination can clinically improve type 1 diabetes in adults between 18 and 60 years of age who have small but still detectable levels of insulin secretion from the pancreas. Faustmans research team was the first group to document reversal of advanced type 1 diabetes in mice and subsequently completed a successful phase I human clinical trial of BCG vaccination. She announced the FDA approval to launch the phase II trial during her ADA presentation, Low Levels of C-Peptide Have Clinical Significance for Established Type 1 Diabetes.
We have learned a lot since the early studies in mice not just about how BCG works but also about its potential therapeutic benefits, similar to what are being seen in trials against other autoimmune diseases, says Faustman. We are so grateful to all of the donors, large and small, who have ma Continue reading

Cocoa compound could 'delay or prevent' type 2 diabetes

Cocoa compound could 'delay or prevent' type 2 diabetes
Cocoa powder antioxidants may help slow diabetes' progression.
With diabetes reaching epidemic proportions, the search is on for innovative ways to reduce the burden. Breaking research finds hope in the most surprising of places- chocolate.
Today, there are an estimated 29 million Americans living with diabetes , with the vast majority of cases beingtype 2 diabetes. Globally, by 2035, there could be 592 million people with diabetes. This is no small problem.
Beyond those Americans who already have a diabetes diagnosis, a further 86 million adults - more than 1 in 3 Americans - have prediabetes, a precursor to the disease. Without intervention (diet and exercise), diabetes is likely to be the next step for these individuals, often within 5 years.
Diabetes is costly in human terms, of course, but it is also a huge financial drain; in 2012, diabetes and itscomplications accounted for $245 billion in total medical costs and lost work and wages, up from $174 billion just 5 years earlier.The statistics are overwhelming.
Although type 2 diabetes is largely preventablethrough lifestyle choices, at this point in time, more needs to be done to stemthe flow and turn the tide.
Finding potential medical interventions for people at risk of developing type 2 diabetes is more pressing than ever. Research, recently published in The Journal of Nutritional Biochemistry , investigates whether a compound found in cocoa could be useful in the fight.
At the root of diabetes is the hormone insulin , which is produced, stored, and re Continue reading

My Diabetes Coach - A Holistic Care Management Solution - Macadamian

My Diabetes Coach A Holistic Care Management Solution
The My Diabetes Coach solution is designed to improve and strengthen the teamwork between parent and child in diabetes management. Establishing and encouraging good practices and patient compliance at an early stage will provide significant benefits to the patients over the years by mitigating the complications that can result from non-compliance.
Most diabetes management solutions on the market today function as logbooks for keeping track of blood glucose levels and some connect to Bluetooth enabled glucometers to make the collection of this data quite simple. However, as anyone with diabetes knows, the measurement of blood glucose levels alone do not paint the entire picture of your condition or your progress towards meeting goals set by your clinician. Diet, exercise, sleep, stress, body weight, and medication compliance all play an important role in mitigating the impacts of the disease but these can be daunting to manage for anyone suffering from diabetes, let alone a youth or young adult recently diagnosed.
Along with contributions from the Childrens Hospital of Eastern Ontario, Healthwise, & the University of Ottawa, weve developed a diabetes care management solution that builds upon the features of many logbook applications as part of a larger, more holistic solution that gains context from multiple devices and patient data to help youth with type 2 diabetes better manage their care.
At its core, My Diabetes Coach is a cloud application that leverages a companion mobile app to collect data from a variety o Continue reading