Does diabetes cause blindness?

Date: 16-June-2022
Thursday
Author: @Shawon130

Diabetes is one of the most common diseases in Bangladesh as well as in South Asia.

We take carbohydrates in food that supply energy for metabolic activities in our body after   glucose oxidation. After digestion carbohydrates such as rice, potato, flour, wheat turn into glucose that is absorbed by intestine and supplied to all the parts of our body by blood.

This glucose is also called blood sugar. Blood sugar is necessary for our body to get energy for our internal and voluntary metabolic activities.

But if this sugar or glucose level in blood increases that is called   diabetes. Insulin, a hormone, secreted from pancreas that helps to intake glucose by cells all over the body and decreases blood glucose level. But if insulin is not produced in pancreas or not sufficient then blood glucose level increases and consequently diabetes occurs.

Diabetes helps to develop many other diseases. Now we will describe vision difficulty due to diabetes.

Diabetic retinopathy

The most common cause of vision loss of patients with diabetes is diabetic retinopathy.

Our eyes have a part in last portion named retina, this retina detects light and send signals to brain via optic nerve. That’s why we can see things.

Due to diabetes, there is high blood sugar in patient’s body. High blood sugar can damage the retina. Then people suffer from vision difficulty and other complications. This conditions are named as diabetic retinopathy.

At early stage diabetic retinopathy usually do not show any symptoms, but some people suffer from troubles like difficulty in seeing faraway objects, reading problem.

Having diabetes for long time increases the risk of diabetic retinopathy. Patients with diabetes see dark, floating spots or streaks in case of later diabetic retinopathy.

Diabetic retinopathy can cause other harmful and serious eye problems like diabetic macular edema, endovascular glaucoma and retinal detachment.

Diabetic macular edema causes blurry vision and endovascular glaucoma can cause vision loss and blindness.

Anyone having diabetes are at risk of getting diabetic retinopathy.

The longer any patient suffers from diabetes, the chance of diabetic retinopathy increases.

If women with diabetes become pregnant or women in whom gestational diabetes develops, they are at the high risk of diabetic retinopathy.

Patients having diabetes should do regular checkup of eye, at least one checkup a year.

If patients have diabetic retinopathy, then treatment at early stage may prevent damage and blindness.

The easiest way to stay free from diabetes retinopathy is to control diabetes.

In later stage   of diabetic retinopathy, patient must get treatment as early as possible. Treatment  for this disease are injection, laser treatment and eye surgery.

Other eye problems:

Cataract: Diabetes increases the risk of developing cataract 2 to 5 times more than normal people. It also increases the chance of developing cataract at an early age.

Cataract is a cloudy, dense area that develops in the lens of eye. Cataract hinders the lens of eye to send clear images to retina.  Thus it hampers normal vision.

Remember, surgery is the only way to remove cataract. So be careful to your health and control diabetes.

Open angle glaucoma: Diabetes increases the chance of developing open angle glaucoma 2 times more than healthy people.

Diabetes is a very irritating disease to an individual. It damages the blood vessels, nerves. Diabetes increases the chance of brain stroke, heart attack, kidney damage etc. It also damages nerve that causes sensation loss of legs. Even the horrible thing is that, diabetes is the main cause of cutting down legs without any accident.

Diabetes is one of the major causes of losing vision.

 Diabetes is not curable for lifetime, but it can be controlled.

Heavy weight, genetically reason, family background is some of the causes of diabetes.

Suggestions: As diabetes brings many other serious disease   it must be control.

Proper diet, light exercise, healthy lifestyle helps to control diabetes.

A study says, minimum 30-minute exercise a day can prevent diabetes for a large number of people.

So, keep healthy lifestyle if you are not a patient of diabetes.  In case you are patient, then try to control diabetes as much as you can.

@Remind it if you have good health than its easy to enjoy life without tension or stress. Without good or healthy body your life will be like a building without strong basement. @

Images Source link :

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