By Sue Danielson, health services

November is American Diabetes Month

Join the American Diabetes Association to put good food and good health on the table during American Diabetes Month in November.

Did you know?

• Nearly 30 million children and adults in the U.S. have diabetes. That is every one in 11 Americans.
• Another 86 million Americans have prediabetes and are at risk for developing type 2 diabetes.
• The American Diabetes Association estimates the total national cost of diagnosed diabetes in the U.S. is $245 billion.

Diabetes is one of the leading causes of disability and death in the United States. It can cause blindness, nerve damage, kidney disease, and other health problems if it’s not controlled. People who are at high risk for type 2 diabetes can lower their risk by more than half if they make healthy changes. These changes include eating healthy, increasing physical activity, and losing weight.

Anyone aged 45 years or older should consider getting tested for diabetes, especially if you are overweight. If you are younger than 45, but are overweight and have one or more additional risk factors, you should consider getting tested.

Additional risk factors:

• Being overweight or obese.
• Having a parent, brother, or sister with diabetes.
• Being African-American, American Indian, Asian-American, Pacific Islander, or Hispanic American/Latino heritage.
• Having a prior history of gestational diabetes or birth of at least one baby weighing more than nine pounds.
• Having high blood pressure measuring 140/90 or higher.
• Having abnormal cholesterol with HDL ("good") cholesterol 35 or lower, or triglyceride level 250 or higher.
• Being physically inactive—exercising fewer than three times a week.

People with blood glucose levels that are higher than normal but not yet in the diabetic range have “prediabetes.” Doctors sometimes call this condition impaired fasting glucose (IFG) or impaired glucose tolerance (IGT), depending on the test used to diagnose it. Insulin resistance and prediabetes usually have no symptoms. You may have one or both conditions for several years without noticing anything.

People with prediabetes have a higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes and have a higher risk of heart disease.

Progression to diabetes among those with prediabetes is not inevitable. Studies suggest that weight loss and increased physical activity among people with prediabetes prevent or delay diabetes and may return blood glucose levels to normal.

For more information, visit the American Diabetes Association website or contact health services at 608-796-3806 or scdanielson@viterbo.edu

(Information obtained from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the American Diabetes Association.)