Wednesday February 8, 2023 – Author: zdr
Children with diabetes need their parents especially: as patient companions and explainers and as loving control bodies. So they can lead a life like many of their peers. Despite all the commitment, parents can also take care of themselves.
Going to a children’s birthday party or to the swimming pool – such adventures are really exciting for children. But children with type 1 diabetes face additional challenges: They have to control their blood sugar and have glucose ready for emergencies. “Nevertheless, it is important that parents deal with their offspring’s diabetes in a relaxed manner and shed their fear of blood sugar imbalances,” writes the pharmacy magazine “Diabetes Ratgeber” in its current issue.
Integrate diabetes into everyday life as a matter of course
“Instead of making diabetes the focus of life, it should be integrated into everyday life,” advises the health magazine. In concrete terms, this can mean: Just like the child brushes its teeth before going to bed, it gives itself insulin before eating. Just as she packs her school bag, her insulin pump catheter is changed every two or three days.
Disease management: Giving children age-appropriate tasks
“Parents should involve the children right away and give them age-appropriate tasks, such as disinfecting skin or measuring blood sugar,” advises Karin Lange, psychologist at the Hannover Medical School (MHH) in the “Diabetes Guide”. Rewards also help. If, for example a new sensor has to be put in place, a pretty sticker distracts from the spade. This makes some children happy and is a great alternative to the washable tattoo. And if you do it cleverly, a spade to check blood sugar doesn’t have to hurt either.
Increasing routine relaxes children and parents
“Teachers, trainers and also parents of friends who are visiting the child should of course know that a child in their care has diabetes and what to do in the event of hypoglycaemia,” is the advice of the “Diabetes Ratgeber”. With older school children who already know their way around, however, parents should be relaxed and trust them to gradually master their lives themselves, because: “With increasing routine, the child can live well with diabetes.” Medical psychologist Karin Lange says: “A large part of children with diabetes develop age-appropriately with a good quality of life, grow with it and lead a life like many of their peers.”
Why does medicine differentiate between type 1 and type 2 diabetes?
A hallmark of diabetes is that the blood glucose level is chronically elevated. This can have two different causes – which is why medicine also differentiates between two types: Type 1 diabetes occurs mainly in childhood or adolescence. An autoimmune destruction of pancreatic cells triggers a lack of insulin, resulting in an increased blood sugar level. Those affected have to inject insulin for life so that the body can even use the sugar from food.
Type 2 diabetes, on the other hand, develops gradually over years and is the result of an unhealthy lifestyle with an unbalanced diet, obesity, lack of exercise and stress. Insulin continues to be produced here. But because the body has been confronted with too much sugar for a long time and the insulin level was chronically high as a result, insulin resistance develops in the cells: they can no longer utilize the sugar as well. The result: Here, too, the blood sugar level is abnormally high. Because type 2 has long affected people over the age of 50, it is also popularly known as “old-age diabetes”. We now know that this disease of civilization can also affect middle-aged or even young people. Type 2 is the more common form of diabetes mellitus.