Diabetes affects around 16 million Americans and about 800,000 new cases are diagnosed each year. Diabetes attacks men, women, children and the elderly. It spares no race.

Diabetes is the leading cause of kidney failure, blindness in Adults and amputations. It is a major risk factor for heart disease, stroke, and birth defects and it shortens life expectancy by up to 15 years. So you can see what I am up against. It is up to me to make sure that none of these things ever happen to my daughter. My daughter Ashley has Diabetes Type 1. She will be 10 years old March 15th. Ashley has been a diabetic for 5 years.

Five years ago I was totally overwhelmed by all that information. I felt helpless and depressed. I was sure this was a death sentence for my daughter. This was because of my total ignorance of Diabetes. A person can live a full life with Diabetes. It just takes some extra care. A good diet plays an important part in a Diabetics life. They need to put together a meal plan with their doctor & dietitian. My daughter has several meals a day. She has breakfast, a snack, lunch, a snack, dinner & another snack. She has these meals at the same time every day. This is important. It helps keep her body on a schedule and her blood sugar regulated. Skipping meals and snacks may lead to large swings in blood sugar readings. To keep blood sugar levels near normal a Diabetic must balance the food they eat with the insulin the body gets from injections and with physical activities. Blood sugar monitoring gives you the information you need to help with this balancing. Near normal blood sugar readings will help you feel better. Normal is between 70 and 120. They will also reduce your chances of complications.

Lets talk about how a Diabetic needs to eat. Everyone needs to eat nutritious foods. Our good health depends on eating a variety of foods that contain the right amount of Carbohydrate, Protein, Fat, Vitamins, Minerals, Fiber and Water. Carbohydrate, Protein and Fat are found in the food that you eat. They supply your body with energy. Your body needs insulin to use this energy. Insulin is made in the pancreas. If you have Diabetes, either your pancreas is no longer producing insulin or your body can’t use the insulin it is making. So your blood sugar levels are not normal.

Starch and Sugar in foods are Carbohydrates. You can find starch in breads, pasta, cereal, potatoes, beans, peas and lentils. Natural sugars are in fruits, milk and vegetables. There are added sugars in desserts, candy, jam and syrup. All of these Carbohydrates can affect your blood sugar. When you eat Carbohydrates they turn into glucose and travel in your bloodstream. Insulin helps the glucose enter the beta cells in your pancreas where it can be turned into energy and stored. Eating the same amount of Carbohydrate daily at meals and snacks can help you control your blood sugar levels. Protein is in meats, poultry, fish, milk and other dairy products, eggs, beans, peas and lentils. Starches and vegetables have small amounts of protein. The body uses protein for growth, maintenance and energy. Your body needs insulin to use the protein you eat.

Fat is in margarine, butter, oils, salad dressings, nuts, seeds, milk, cheese, meat, fish, poultry, snack food, ice-cream and desserts. There are three different types of fat. Monounsaturated, polyunsaturated and saturated. Everyone should eat less saturated fats found in meats, dairy products, coconut, palm or palm kernel oil, and hardened shortening.

Saturated fats can raise your blood levels of cholesterol. The fats that are best are the monounsaturated fats found in canola oil, olive oil, nuts, and avocado. The polyunsaturated fats found in corn oil, soybean oil, or sunflower oil are good too. After you eat fat it travels through your bloodstream. You need insulin to store fat in the cells of your body. Fats are used for energy.

So you can see what a big role insulin plays in your body. Good diet is very important for a Diabetic. Excersize is also very important. A Diabetic can live a healthy full life if they do three things. Eat healthy, Excersize, and inject the right amount of insulin. It takes dedication and hard work. But in the end it is totally worth it because it is your life.

I am a diabetes expert. No I’m not a doctor or a nurse. I am a mom. A mom to a 13 year old girl named Ashley who has Juvenile Diabetes. Ashley was diagnosed with Juvenile Diabetes just before her fifth birthday. She went into a diabetic coma and almost died. None of that would have happened if I had known the warning signs. In this article I am going to give you some information on diabetes and the warning signs.

There are two types of Diabetes. Type I - Juvenile Diabetes and Type II - Adult Onset Diabetes. Here we are going to concentrate on Type I.

With Type I , which mainly occurs in young people, the pancreas produces very little or no insulin. This disease is now being classed as an Auto-immune disease. This is what can happen. A person becomes ill with a flu-like virus. Normally the white blood cells would attack these invading organisms and the person would begin to get better. But, in a person prone to diabetes the white blood cells become confused and attack the beta cells in the pancreas. To better understand this let me explain what the pancreas does. The pancreas is a gland positioned behind the stomach. It has two major functions. The first is to produce enzymes that help to digest food. The second is to produce the hormones insulin and glucagon. These two hormones are important because they play a major part in regulating the glucose (sugar) level in your blood by keeping it at an even or normal level. When your pancreas becomes damaged it is unable to manufacture insulin. Insulin helps your beta cells absorb sugar. Your body needs the sugar to produce energy. Your body, unable to use glucose because of the lack of insulin, is forced to obtain energy from fat instead. This is very dangerous and if not treated eventually leads to a coma.

If you are aware of them the warning signs are very easy to see. The warning signs of Juvenile Diabetes are: irritability, frequent urination which is associated with abnormal thirst, nausea or vomiting, fatigue, weight loss despite a normal (or even increased) intake of food, and unusual hunger. Something usually not mentioned but, which happened with my daughter was nightmares & sleep walking. In children, frequent bedwetting - especially by a child who never previously wet the bed - is another common sign. Just before going into a coma you will notice breath that smells like acetone (ex:fingernail polish remover). This is a sign of ketoacidosis. You should get this person to the hospital immediately.

People with Type I Diabetes are subject to episodes in which blood glucose levels are very high (hyperglycemia) and very low (hypoglycemia). Either of these conditions can lead to a serious medical emergency. To better understand this you should know that a normal blood glucose level is between 70 - 120. When my daughter went into a diabetic coma her level was over 1,000. She has been as low as 19. This is very scary. This is what I notice when Ashley becomes low. You look into her eyes and she looks far away. Her eyes are glassy and vacant looking. She becomes confused, disoriented and sometimes combative. Her speech is slow and often slurred. Her hand will tremble and she says she feels shaky. Sometimes Ashley does not recall these episodes.

Episodes of hypoglycemia (low blood glucose) which strikes suddenly, can be caused by a missed meal, too much excersize, or a reaction to too much insulin. The initial signs are hunger, dizziness, sweating, confusion, palpitations, and numbness or tingling of the lips. If not treated the individual may go on to experience double vision, trembling and disorientation; they may act strangely and may even lapse into a coma.

In contrast, a hyperglycemic (high blood glucose) episode can come on over a period of several hours or even weeks. The risk of hyperglycemia is greatest during illness. When insulin requirements rise; blood sugar can creep, ultimately resulting in a coma, a reaction also known as diabetic ketoacidosis. One of the warning signs of developing hyperglycemia is the inability to keep down fluids. Possible long term complications include stroke, blindness, heart disease, kidney failure, gangrene, and nerve damage.

Diabetes affects the manner in which the body handles carbohydrates, fats and proteins. If neglected, diabetes can have serious complications. The diabetic people have high blood sugar level. The blood sugar level is regulated by insulin - a hormone produced by the pancreas, which depends on your eating habits.

The symptoms of diabetes included excessive urination, excessive thirst and hunger, sudden weight loss, blurred vision, delay in healing of wounds, dry and itchy skin, repeated infections, fatigue and headache. These diabetes symptoms may be due to other reasoons also.

There are two different types of diabetes.

Type I Diabetes (juvenile diabetes or insulin-dependent diabetes): The reason for type I diabetes is due to pancreas unability to produce insulin.

Type II Diabetes (non insulin dependent diabetes or adult onset diabetes): This diabetes is a result of body tissues becoming resistant to insulin. It is usually hereditary.

If neglected, diabetes can lead to various complications such as damage to the kidneys, heart disease, nerve damage, hypoglycemia (drastic reduction in glucose levels). Diabetes is a serious disease and there is no treatment of it. However, it can be brought under control by proper diabetes diet plan. Fortunately, with a healthy lifestyle and with diet management you can lead a healthy life.

Benfotiamine made headlines globally in 2003 when researchers released information about a study that was conducted at The Einstein College of Medicine in New York. The bottom line of this study was that a substance of the allithiamine group of the naturally occurring thiamine-derived compounds had positive effects on neuropathy, retinopathy and nephropathy and heart/circulatory problems in diabetics.

Benfotiamine research has suggested that there are beneficial effects for diabetics and non-diabetics also. These benefits include sciatica, vascular health, general nerve health, lower blood pressure, grant cellular protection, anti-aging, fibromyalgia, prevention of lactic acidosis, and treatment for Alzheimer’s disease. Any condition that is the result of a thiamine deficiency will also respond quite well to benfotiamine. Of course, any bodily function that is improved by a therapeutic level of thiamine will certainly be enhanced by benfotiamine, since benfotiamine is perhaps the most effective form of thiamine.

Benfotiamine, a derivative of thiamine (vitamin B1), was an invention of Japanese scientists and there is a U.S. patent on benfotiamine that was entered by the Japanese back in 1962. Japanese benfotiamine is considered the purest source of bulk benfotiamine and is favored by manufacturers globally who insist on the highest quality in their benfotiamine product.

The safety of benfotiamine use has been proven over 12 years of use in Europe for the treatment and prevention of diabetic complications among others. The original Japanese patent on benfotiamine gave information that it is even less toxic than common vitamin B1 (thiamine hydrochloride usually). Orally ingested vitamin B1 has a long history of use as an oral supplement without reported adverse effects. Due to its therapeutic action in some frequently observed clinical syndromes, thiamine hydrochloride has been advised and used over a long period of time. There are no reports of adverse effects of oral thiamine, even at dosages of several hundred milligrams a day (SCOGS, 1978; DHEW, 1979; Marks, 1989).

Benfotiamine has a very good safety record. To date, there has been no reports of any known, negative interactions with any medications. To the contrary, some medications actually can cause a thiamine deficiency in some people and benfotiamine could correct this serious situation.

Many researchers, medical experts, doctors, podiatrists and many medical publishers recommend benfotiamine for neuropathy, retinopathy nephropathy, heart/circulatory complications and B1 deficiencies. Any in depth study on the web will produce physicians, naturopaths, neurologists, optometrists, chiropractors, etc. who have very positive feelings about the effectiveness and potential of benfotiamine in terms of the research done to date on this important tool in the arsenal against neuropathy, retinopathy and beneficial for the heart and circulatory system. We have professional healthcare providers from all of these disciplines which shows the confidence the medical community has in the purity and bioavailability of our benfotiamine product.