Seven million diabetes patients in Pakistan

Health experts urged diabetic patients on Monday to use insulin regularly in order to avert serious health hazards posed by diabetes, as two people are diagnosed with this fatal disease in every 10 seconds while one person dies of diabetes-related causes. They were addressing a public awareness seminar organised by Shifa International Hospital to observe the World Diabetes Day. A large number of patients, doctors, medical students and people belonging to different segments of society attended the seminar, whereas free blood tests to check diabetes were conducted on the occasion. Shifa Emergency Department Director and Consultant Internal Medicine Dr Abdus Salam briefed the audience on the disease and its prevalence.
“Seven million people become victim of diabetes every year around the globe and 70 thousand children suffer from type-1 diabetes every year, whereas more than 7 million people in Pakistan are diabetes patients,” Dr Salam stated. He said diabetes could badly affect eyes, brain, heart, kidneys and legs. “It’s one of the major causes of blindness and kidney failure.” While informing the participants about the symptoms, he said need to urinate several times, feeling severe thrust, reducing weight and fatigue and weakness were important symptoms of this deadly disease. He, however, said such indicators were usually missing in type-2 diabetes. “Taking balanced diet, regular exercise, weight control, regular medication and proper test of blood glucose level are a few essential factors that can help to control diabetes,” he observed.
Leading endocrinologist at Shifa International Hospital Dr Usama Ishtiaq said insulin was not a medicine but a hormone from pancreas that reduced glucose level in blood. “When insulin level decreases in the human body, it results in high blood glucose level that eventually causes diabetes.” He stressed the need of starting the use of insulin to control diabetes well in time.
He said human body used glucose as energy to perform functions. “It only performs well when glucose enters in a cell.”
“However, diabetes hampers proper functioning,” he said, adding, “Insulin primarily works to let glucose enter in the cell.”
According to Dr Usama, whenever we take food, glucose increases in the blood that makes insulin; however, production of insulin significantly reduces in diabetes, causing serious issues.
While encouraging patients to use insulin, he informed them about various methods of injecting insulin in the body including insulin syringe, pin, jet injector, pump and automatic injector.
He advised them to inject insulin in subcutaneous tissue layer situated between the skin layer and muscle layer. He also asked them to mark different places on the body for insulin injection and never inject on same place every time.
Dr Usama observed that exercise, heat, place of injection and quantity of insulin were a few factors that could affect required results of injection. “You should use new insulin syringe every time,” he insisted.
“Also, you should set your timetable for taking meals in accordance with insulin timing.”
He also asked the participants not to reduce insulin injection or abandon taking medicine if blood glucose level is controlled. “Injecting insulin in two patients with one syringe can be fatal for both,” he said while advising them to remove dressing from the particular piece of skin before injecting insulin.