By Gina Park, NCS
(NCS) — When was the final time you had your blood sugar checked? It could be value wanting into, a new study says.
Forty-four % of people age 15 and older residing with diabetes are undiagnosed, so they don’t know they have it, in line with knowledge evaluation printed Monday within the journal The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology.
The study checked out knowledge from 204 nations and territories from 2000 to 2023 in a scientific evaluation of printed literature and surveys. The findings on the world stage are for people age 15 and older.
“The majority of people with diabetes that we report on in the study have type 2 diabetes,” stated Lauryn Stafford , the lead creator of the study.
Around 1 in 9 adults stay with diabetes worldwide, in line with the International Diabetes Foundation. In the United States, 11.6% of Americans have diabetes, in line with 2021 knowledge from the American Diabetes Association.
“We found that 56% of people with diabetes are aware that they have the condition,” stated Stafford, a researcher for the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. “Globally, there’s a lot of variation geographically, and also by age. So, generally, higher-income countries were doing better at diagnosing people than low- and middle-income countries.”
Younger people don’t know they have diabetes
People below 35 years had been a lot much less prone to be identified if they had diabetes than people in center age or older. Just “20% of young adults with diabetes were aware of their condition,” Stafford stated.
Routine screenings aren’t promoted as a lot for younger adults as for older adults. Many bigger organizations, just like the American Diabetes Association, counsel annual routine screenings for adults 35 and older.
“You can survive with elevated glucose levels for many, many years,” Stafford stated. “People end up getting diagnosed with diabetes only at the point where they have complications,” that are extra widespread in older adults.
Depending on how lengthy an individual has had diabetes earlier than it’s found, the well being impacts could differ.
“Diagnosing diabetes early is important because it allows for timely management to prevent or delay long-term complications such as heart disease, kidney failure, nerve damage, and vision loss,” stated Rita Kalyani, chief scientific and medical officer on the American Diabetes Association. She was not concerned within the study.
Around one-third of adults are identified with diabetes later than their earliest symptom, in line with a 2018 study.
What signs do you have to search for?
“Symptoms of diabetes include increased thirst or hunger, frequent urination, blurry vision, unexpected weight loss, and fatigue. However, in the early stages, most people with diabetes are asymptomatic, which highlights the importance of screening and diagnosis,” stated Kalyani, a professor of drugs within the division of endocrinology, diabetes and metabolism at Johns Hopkins University.
If you expertise any of these symptoms or have a historical past of diabetes in your loved ones, consultants advocate you get a glucose screening.
Globally, in 2023, about 40% of people with handled diabetes had been getting optimum outcomes and reducing their blood sugar, stated Stafford. That’s why it’s necessary that future efforts concentrate on guaranteeing that extra people obtain and comply with correct remedy post-diagnosis.
That solely 4 in 10 sufferers had been seeing optimum outcomes was shocking, as a number of well-established remedies, together with insulin, Metformin and different medication like GLP-1s, can be found.
People with diabetes doubtless additionally have different well being points, equivalent to hypertension or continual kidney illness, which may make remedy advanced, Stafford added.
Can you forestall diabetes?
It relies upon.
While there isn’t any recognized solution to forestall type 1 diabetes, there are numerous methods to forestall the extra widespread kind of type 2 diabetes.
Reducing the quantity of purple and processed meats you eat may help decrease your threat of sort 2 diabetes, as previously reported by NCS. You might do that with a Mediterranean diet or by introducing extra plant-based meals to your meals.
In addition, restrict the quantity of ultraprocessed foods you eat, including extra complete meals, like fruits and nuts, as a substitute.
Incorporating physical activity into your common routine may also lower your threat of growing not solely diabetes but additionally different continual ailments. Fast strolling for no less than 15 minutes a day is only one kind of train you are able to do.
“I think, ultimately, if we can also focus more on the risk factors for developing diabetes — preventing people from needing to be diagnosed in the first place — that is also critical,” Stafford stated.
The-NCS-Wire
™ & © 2025 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.