Diabetes

Diabetes

Overview

Diabetes is a metabolic disease in which the body is unable to create enough insulin or none at all. Insulin, in the body is a conserved hormone, which maintains glucose homeostasis along with glucagon.  These hormones work together to balance the correct level of glucose in the blood stream.  When food is eaten, the pancreas releases the hormone insulin to decrease the amount of glucose flowing around in the blood vessels.  When the body is in between meals and there is no additional glucose being added in the bloodstream, the pancreas releases the hormone glucagon into the blood stream to keep the glucose levels steady.  When insulin is not being released by the pancreas, diabetes comes into play. When you have diabetes the glucose levels in the body are out of balance and will lead to dangerously elevated levels of glucose in the bloodstream.  There is no insulin to send out signals to inform the body of the high levels of glucose. 

Insulin works by moving the glucose out of the bloodstream and into cells for energy. The body can use this energy or put it into storage and have energy later when it is needed.  When food is eaten and digested it is converted to glucose.  The glucose then goes into the bloodstream, which then sends out a signal to the pancreas to produce insulin, in order to get the excess level of glucose out of the bloodstream and into the cells (Morris).  In the pancreas, the beta cells are what produce the insulin.  In a study, they studied a potential way to create insulin by allowing beta cell re-growth to occur by inhibiting the GSK3 pathway.  Inhibiting the GSK3 pathway has lead to the observation of beta cell growth and survival in rat insulinoma cells.  Though GSK3 is not completely understood, it has been linked to beta cell growth and survival (Mussmann).

There are two types of diabetes; the first being type I diabetes. This type of diabetes is usually diagnosed in people at a younger age, but can manifest itself at any time. It is believed that this type is a genetic disease and is passed down from generation to generation. In addition, there could be environmental triggers that cause the body to attack the beta cells in the pancreas, which inhibits the production of insulin. It is known as an autoimmune disease, in which, the body attacks itself; thinking that the normal beta cells are foreign cells, and clears the body of them. Currently, the only treatment is insulin dependence via an injection or pump.  Type II diabetes, the most common type, is known as insulin resistant. This due to the fact that, in the beginning, your pancreas produces extra insulin to overcome the inefficiency of the existing insulin and works harder to keep up with the glucose levels in the bloodstream.  Over time, the pancreas wears down from working so hard and is unable to make enough insulin in order to keep the glucose level steady in the blood stream.  It becomes resistant to making insulin for the body to function correctly (Association, Type 2).

Diseases linked to diabetes

Several other diseases have been linked with diabetes.  The manifestation of these diseases, are factors that influence the severity or likelihood of having diabetes.  In the article, Obesity and diabetes: The Increased Risk of Cancer and Cancer-related Mortality, they explored multiple animal studies, in which, they had observed links between obesity and cancer, diabetes and cancer, and obesity and diabetes.  The researchers of this article were able to, through graphing data; demonstrate that in the course of no insulin production, different diseases come about. 

One of the pathways illustrate a person with type II diabetes, in fact, portrays that insulin resistance.  The insulin resistance causes hyperinsulinemia, which causes the beta cells to produce more insulin and to work in overdrive.  In effect, the beta cells work too hard until they eventually fail and thus leads to hyperglycemia.  In turn, hyperglycemia creates such conditions, in which the tumor cells are able to grow and develop a cancerous tumor. This is the pathway of someone who starts out diabetic, but consecutively, is now at a higher risk to develop cancer. There are several different pathways that could potentially lead to a higher risk for stemming into another disease. At the conclusion of this article, it was stated that having multiple diseases such as obesity and type II diabetes, and the links they have to one another, puts a person at higher risk for developing and dying from cancer (LeRoith and Gallagher). 

Economics

In having a disease, there is always a cost associated with it. There is a cost for the treatments you need to take care of it, a cost for the medical research being done to find the cure or treatments for it, and for the labs and doctor visits ultimately leading to a diagnosis.  There are more factors that go into costs as illustrated in the following. There are both direct costs that you pay and indirect costs.  In an article, Economic Costs of Diabetes in the U.S. in 2012, they used studies to predict the cost in the US, including the people with diabetes and the costs associated with the disease.  For 2012, they predict it would cost 245 billion dollars to take care of everyone with the disease.  They divided this into the direct medical cost, which came to 176 billion dollars, and 69 billion dollars for the reduced productivity that comes at the price of having the disease (Association, Economic Costs of Diabetes in the U.S. in 2012).

With the information provided, not many people understand what the government and individuals really pay for this disease.  Normally, people look at it from a personal view and see as if they are paying for it and what their financial stand is for being able to pay for the disease or having the government pay for the disease through insurance.  From a personal experience, I was able to talk with my aunt who has a son that has type 1 diabetes.  He was diagnosed with diabetes at a very young age and has had to have the constant supply of insulin.  Looking at paying for that in his point of view is that it is very expensive and little things like the testing blood sugar strips add up.  Looking at this particular cost he uses 3-5 strips a day; it cost about $1 per strip so if you multiply that for a month it adds up to around $400.  This over the years he has had the disease it would have cost him over $50,000+ just in the strips he needs to test his blood sugar.  With this information for just a single person, we can more easily understand why it would cost around 245 billion dollars (Association, Economic Costs of Diabetes in the U.S. in 2012).

Connections

Through these several different articles and information on diabetes, there are links throughout all of them.  One major connection was that between the cost of having the disease and the sections of other diseases with diabetes.  In the section of having other diseases like cancer because of having diabetes, in the beginning, would add more costs to the person that just having diabetes.  Since a person can start with poor health puts them at higher risk for developing more disease this then can add up to more costs because the person has more treatments they need to take care of both diseases and then more doctor visits to diagnose the second disease. 

The second connection between the articles is the overview of how diabetes works and the section of other diseases with diabetes.  The understanding of the body and the different pathways that are not working correctly will help us find how the disease diabetes works, and will give us insight to how to prevent other diseases from developing.  Through this research, hopefully, they can find a way to cure or prevent diabetes from happening or have control over diabetes more so that it doesn't put the person at higher risk for developing another disease like obesity or cancer.  This research is of much benefit to the world population to understand the pathways more and find the different connections to the different diseases. 

The third connection of these articles is that of the overview and the economics of having diabetes.  If the researchers are able to fully understand the role each pathway and find a way to create a permanent treatment this could potentially reduce the cost of having the disease and the money can go towards other research to benefit the population in a different way.  But also with this, there could be potential problems like would the cure for this cost too much for the general public to pay for it.  Even with a cure, there is still a cost associated with it. 

Conclusion

Through the reflection and research of diabetes, we can conclude that there is still a lot of research that needs to be done.  There has also been some progress in learning a pathway that could lead to potentially beta cell growth and insulin production.  Having a disease like diabetes puts you at higher risk to develop another disease.  The pathways of different diseases are linked allows us to better understand the basics of how the disease works.  And that there are always costs associated with having a disease.  Through these finding, we see the importance we have for understanding the disease diabetes more.

Works Cited

Association, American Diabetes. "Economic Costs of Diabetes in the U.S. in 2012." Diabetes Care (2013): 1033-1046. Article.

—. Type 2. 2016. Web. 22 September 2016.

LeRoith, Emily Jane and Derek Gallagher. "Obesity and Diabetes: The Increase Risk of Cancer and Cancer-Related Mortality." American Physiological Society (2015): 727-748. Article.

Morris, Susan York. How Insulin and Glucagon Work. 2014 August 2014. web. 22 September 2016.

Mussmann, Rainer...et al. "Inhibition of GSK3 Promotes Replication and Survival of Pancreatic Beta Cells." The Journal of Biological Chemistry (2007): 12030-12037. Document.