Diabetes Mellitus DIAGNOSIS AND TREATMENT

 Diabetes is detected by measuring the amount of glucose in the blood after an individual has fasted (abstained from food) for about eight hours. In some cases, physicians diagnose diabetes by administering an oral glucose tolerance test, which measures glucose levels before and after a specific amount of sugar has been ingested. 

 Once diabetes is diagnosed, treatment consists of controlling the amount of glucose in the blood and preventing complications. Depending on the type of diabetes, this can be accomplished through regular physical exercise, a carefully controlled diet, and medication. Individuals with Type 1 diabetes must receive insulin, often two to four times a day, to provide the body with the hormone it does not produce. Insulin cannot be taken orally, because it is destroyed in the digestive system. 

Consequently, insulin-dependent diabetics have historically injected the drug using a hypodermic needle or a beeper-sized pump connected to a needle inserted under the skin. In 2006 the United States Food and Drug Administration approved a form of insulin that can be inhaled and then is absorbed by blood in the lungs. The amount of insulin needed varies from person to person and may be influenced by factors such as a person’s level of physical activity, diet, and the presence of other health disorders. 

Typically, individuals with Type 1 diabetes use a meter several times a day to measure the level of glucose in a drop of their blood obtained by pricking a fingertip. They can then adjust the dosage of insulin, physical exercise, or food intake to maintain the blood sugar at a normal level. People with Type 1 diabetes must carefully control their diets by distributing meals and snacks throughout the day so as not to overwhelm the ability of the insulin supply to help cells absorb glucose. They also need to eat foods that contain complex sugars, which break down slowly and cause a slower rise in blood sugar levels. Although most persons with Type 1 diabetes strive to lower the amount of glucose in their blood, levels that are too low can also cause health problems. For example, if a person with Type 1 diabetes takes too much insulin, it can produce low blood sugar levels. This may result in hypoglycemia, a condition characterized by shakiness, confusion, and anxiety. 

A person who develops hypoglycemia can combat symptoms by ingesting glucose tablets or by consuming foods with high sugar content, such as fruit juices or hard candy. In order to control insulin levels, people with Type 1 diabetes must monitor their glucose levels several times a day. In 1983 a group of 1,441 Type 1 diabetics aged 13 to 39 began participating in the Diabetes Control and Complications Trial (DCCT), the largest scientific study of diabetes treatment ever undertaken. The DCCT studied the potential for reducing diabetes-related complications, such as nerve or kidney disease or eye disorders, by having patients closely monitor their blood sugar levels four to six times a day, maintaining the levels as close to normal as possible. The results of the study, reported in 1993, showed a 50 to 75 percent reduction of diabetic complications in people who aggressively monitored and controlled their glucose levels. Although the study was performed on people with Type 1 diabetes, researchers believe that close monitoring of blood sugar levels would also benefit people with Type 2 diabetes. For persons with Type 2 diabetes, treatment begins with diet control, exercise, and weight reduction, although over time this treatment may not be adequate. 

People with Type 2 diabetes typically work with nutritionists to formulate a diet plan that regulates blood sugar levels so that they do not rise too swiftly after a meal. A recommended meal is usually low in fat (30 percent or less of total calories), provides moderate protein (10 to 20 percent of total calories), and contains a variety of carbohydrates, such as beans, vegetables, and grains. Regular exercise helps body cells absorb glucose—even ten minutes of exercise a day can be effective. Diet control and exercise may also play a role in weight reduction, which appears to partially reverse the body’s inability to use insulin. For some people with Type 2 diabetes, diet, exercise, and weight reduction alone may work initially, but eventually this regimen does not help control high blood sugar levels. In these cases, oral medication may be prescribed. 

If oral medications are ineffective, a person with Type 2 diabetes may need insulin doses or a combination of oral medication and insulin. About 50 percent of individuals with Type 2 diabetes require oral medications, 40 percent require insulin or a combination of insulin and oral medications, and 10 percent use diet and exercise alone.

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HOW HIV INFECTION SPREADS ?

Scientists have identified three ways that HIV infections spread: sexual intercourse with an infected person, contact with contaminated blood, and transmission from an infected mother to her child before or during birth or through breast-feeding

A. Sex with an Infected Person
HIV transmission occurs most commonly during intimate sexual contact with an infected person, including genital, anal, and oral sex. The virus is present in the infected person’s semen or vaginal fluids. During sexual intercourse, the virus gains access to the bloodstream of the uninfected person by passing through openings in the mucous membrane—the protective tissue layer that lines the mouth, vagina, and rectum—and through breaks in the skin of the penis. In the United States and Canada, HIV is most commonly transmitted during sex between men, but the incidence of HIV transmission between men and women has rapidly increased. In most other parts of the world, HIV is most commonly transmitted through heterosexual sex.

 
B. Contact with Infected Blood
Direct contact with HIV-infected blood occurs when people who use heroin or other injected drugs share hypodermic needles or syringes contaminated with infected blood. Sharing of contaminated needles among intravenous drug users has been a primary cause of HIV infection in parts of eastern Europe and central Asia.
Less frequently, HIV infection results when health professionals accidentally stick themselves with needles containing HIV-infected blood or expose an open cut to contaminated blood. Some cases of HIV transmission from transfusions of infected blood, blood components, and organ donations were reported in the 1980s. Since 1985 government regulations in the United States and Canada have required that all donated blood and body tissues be screened for the presence of HIV before being used in medical procedures. As a result of these regulations, HIV transmission caused by contaminated blood transfusion or organ donations is rare in North America. However, the problem continues to concern health officials in sub-Saharan Africa. 

 
C. Mother-to-Child Transmission
HIV can be transmitted from an infected mother to her baby while the baby is still in the woman’s uterus or, more commonly, during childbirth. The virus can also be transmitted through the mother’s breast milk during breast-feeding. Mother-to-child transmission accounts for 90 percent of all cases of AIDS in children. Mother-to-child transmission is particularly prevalent in Africa.

 
D. Misperceptions About HIV Transmission
The routes of HIV transmission are well documented by scientists, but health officials continually grapple with people’s unfounded fears concerning the potential for HIV transmission by other means. HIV differs from other infectious viruses in that it dies quickly if exposed to the environment. No evidence has linked HIV transmission to casual contact with an infected person, such as a handshake, hugging, or kissing, or even sharing dishes or bathroom facilities. Studies have been unable to identify HIV transmission from modes common to other infectious diseases, such as an insect bite or inhaling virus-infected droplets from an infected person’s sneeze or cough.

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Perfect Diet and Durable ?

Diet choises

Pennsylvania, United States, many people lose weight. But weight loss diet results achieved are generally rare painstakingly lasting aka yo-yo dieting because people who succeed diet fail to maintain weight loss diet results.

Though the diet that the body can not consistently give bad effects to the body. This yo-yo dieting can make someone worse shape than before he was on a diet, because it often ignores portion of the exercise or physical activity and poor diet.

A new study conducted by researchers from Penn State College of Medicine, has demonstrated that the technique is to lose weight may not be used or managed in the helps maintain ideal weight.

The study notes there are four strategies that can be done to maintain ideal body weight to keep it but did not make it decreases, as quoted from Healthland.Time, Friday (8/7/2011), namely:

1. Keep eating foods rich in protein but low in fat
2. Keep up a consistent exercise program
3. Appreciate yourself to keep your diet and exercise
4. Considering himself about why he needed to maintain weight

Nutrition and obesity experts said the principles that form the basis of losing weight and keep it the ideal is the same, namely a person should eat a healthy diet and increasing physical activity like sports.

One important thing is to maintain the mindset to start focusing on the long term and not short term, that is, make changes in lifestyle and behavior permanently so that the results obtained can last a long time.

Experts have agreed that the key to success in losing and maintaining weight loss is motivation he had. Due to this motivation will lead a person to change lifestyle and behavior gradually.

source : DETIk

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Social effects of Alcoholism

Throughout most of history, society has viewed people who drink to excess as irresponsible, immoral, and of weak character. Punishment of drunkards was considered necessary to protect the community.

By the early 1900s, experts conceded that alcohol dependence may result from tissue changes caused by the action of alcohol. These changes produce a continued need to drink, such that the individual seeks larger amounts of alcohol at more frequent intervals. However, society still regarded taking or rejecting a drink as a matter of personal decision, thus all excessive drinking was considered a voluntary act. The individual, therefore, was held responsible for his or her behavior.

 
Although a consensus is growing among health professionals that alcohol dependence is a disease, society’s attitudes toward individuals with drinking problems remain ambivalent and confused. Until the mid-20th century, the typical picture of the alcoholic was of someone without steady employment, unable to sustain family relationships and most likely in desperate financial straits. But this stereotype was largely dispelled when highly respected people publicly admitted their alcohol dependence and shared their successful recovery stories. Particularly critical in changing the way Americans view alcohol-use disorders were New York broker William Griffith Wilson (more familiarly known as Bill W.) and Ohio physician Robert Holbrook Smith (Dr. Bob). In 1935 these two recovered alcoholics developed a program to promote their successful philosophy for recovering from alcohol dependence. The program, which became known as Alcoholics Anonymous, has spread around the world, helping millions of members to avoid alcohol use and rebuild their lives. In the late 1970s Betty Ford, the wife of former U.S. president Gerald Ford, disclosed her struggle to recover from alcohol dependence. She helped raise the public’s understanding about alcohol dependence through her open, honest revelations and her creation of a groundbreaking treatment center for substance abusers in Rancho Mirage, California, now known as the Betty Ford Center.

 
Intoxication threatens not only the individual who drinks but also the surrounding community. Therefore, societies around the world have attempted to control excessive use of alcohol. Temperance societies in the 19th and 20th centuries pushed for laws ranging from arrest and jail sentences for public drunkenness to prohibition of the manufacture, distribution, and consumption of alcoholic beverages.

 
Today experts characterize alcohol-use disorders as a form of illness, and one so widespread that it constitutes a major public health problem. According to WHO, alcohol dependence and other alcohol-use disorders undermine global health, accounting for 3.5 percent of the total cases of disease worldwide. This figure equals the hazards posed by unsafe sex and surpasses two other formidable health foes, tobacco and illicit drugs. In the United States alone, the NIAAA estimates that alcoholism causes losses of more than $185 billion a year in lost productivity, illness, and premature death.

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Danger behind Isotonic Drinks

Isotonic drinks more incentive to invade the market. Through advertising, the product is imaged able to replace lost body fluids in a short time. Behind the impression of freshness, isotonic drinks can be dangerous if taken carelessly.

An isotonic beverage ads on television say, ions in the isotonic able to keep the skin moist and your body better than ordinary water. Another ad says, losing two percent of body fluids will decrease your stamina and concentration.
Lecturer at the Department of Food Science and Technology, Bogor Agricultural University, Frances Rungkat Zakaria, said the advertising of products isotonic partly misleading the public. In the ad, as if to drink isotonic anybody and under any conditions.
In fact, Frances warned, could not consume isotonic drinks arbitrary because it contains sodium salt (NaCl).
"Look at the label, there must be its content of Na and Cl," said Frances. He added, isotonic drink is none other than saline solution. By the manufacturer, the solution was then given additional other substances, such as vitamins. Ion which was mentioned very beneficial for the body is actually not only contained in the isotonic.
Each salt is dissolved in water, said Frances, will inevitably turn into ions Na and Cl ions.
"So, the ions contained in the vegetable lodeh with isotonic ion in the same," said Frances. As it contains salt, isotonic should not be taken lightly.
If excessive levels of salt in the body will cause high blood pressure or hypertension. "When you've got hypertension, just waiting for the part of the body is broken first," said Frances.

 
From food

 
When our bodies sweat, sodium and chloride contained in body fluids come out through the pores of the skin. If the two substances were not replaced, the cells of our bodies too long will damage and death. The problem, of which sodium and chloride substance is obtained?
Should it be of an isotonic drink? The answer is no.
According to Frances, the food we consume daily is sufficient to replace sodium and chloride out with sweat. "Every time I cook, we always use salt. That's enough to replace the salt out of the body. Even excessive, "said Frances.
He warned, in normal conditions, the adult body requires only 2.3 grams of sodium per day, whereas chloride is only 50-100 mg.
In children, it needs two substances less than adults. When we cook without salt, sodium and chloride also needs can be met from food .. He pointed out, an ounce of red meat contains 70 mg of sodium, while each 10 ounces of rice contains 10 mg of sodium. Other foodstuffs, such as eggs, chicken, beans, fruits, and vegetables, also contain sodium.
"Therefore, under normal conditions, we no longer need to replace body fluids with isotonic," said Frances. Frances reminded, consumed more suitable isotonic athletes who wrestle strenuous exercise.
Strenuous exercise in athletes, the need for sodium is higher than the average person, which is 5-7 grams per day. Even so, should be calculated in advance whether sodium and chloride are required athletes in question had acquired enough of the food consumed. If still less, may be added to the isotonic.
In developed countries, said Frances, there are agencies that examine and calculate the amount of sodium in foods consumed by athletes.
The result, which served meals three times a day it already contains 6 grams of sodium.

Outwit

 
Although isotonic should not be taken carelessly, some isotonic product advertisements use models instead of ordinary people (not athletes) as
isotonic consumers. Isotonic beverages was also drunk at ordinary conditions, such as stuck in traffic that is not always synonymous with the release of ions to excess body.
Even mentioned, without naming the condition, isotonic better than plain water. According to Frances, such advertising is misleading the public. Manufacturers may only attract a buyer with a creative ad, but the ads have also been included clear information, not misleading information.
Manufacturers should also include beverages that contain salt warning. That consumers can make the best decision, it should be mentioned also how much salt it takes a human per day. "Indeed, manufacturers will be noisy. If the label is applied, their products will not sell.
However, do not because of economic interests, public health is at stake, "said Frances. So, although it seems refreshing, be careful if you want to consume isotonic.

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