Nine Curious Facts About Diabetes

It would seem that only today is not known to patients about diabetes – one of the most common diseases of our time? Mainly due to the efforts of the media. Nevertheless, endocrinologist Leonid Zaitsev tried to collect and present little-known and curious facts about this disease to MedPulse readers.

How diabetes was treated before
The first attempts to treat diabetes were made before our era. Ancient Greek and Roman physicians used for this massage, gymnastics, baths, aromatherapy and much more. In the 19th century, a low-carbohydrate meat diet was developed for patients with diabetes. After several decades, many more diets appeared, opium therapy and bloodletting became popular. However, diets in which the number of calories consumed were strictly limited proved to be the most effective. This was difficult for patients, however, it somewhat prolonged the life of patients with type 2 diabetes, in which not the production of insulin, but the sensitivity of cells to it decreases. With type 1 diabetes (partial or complete cessation of insulin production), things were much sadder: before the advent of insulin therapy, patients with this disease died soon after the onset of the first symptoms. Continue reading →