DIABETES? ANXIETY?
Are patients diagnosed with diabetes at greater risk for anxiety? The answer is yes. Anxiety is defined as intense and persistent fearful worry. Symptoms include fatigue, distress, fear, palpitations, apprehension and depression. Anxiety is often caused by a stressful situation. Diabetes can be a trigger for this situation. There are studies implying that stress causes imbalance in blood sugar or that blood sugar imbalances causes stress.
There are many causes for stress related anxiety in a diabetic patient. Just imagine waking each morning to finger stick monitoring, medications (oral or injections), and managing diet and exercise sometimes to realize that goals have not been met for the day.
Traveling is stressful along with the increasing expense of drugs and supplies. Patients also worry about damage to organs (heart, kidneys).
One issue to consider is that both hypoglycemia (low blood glucose) and hyperglycemia (high blood glucose) can mimic anxiety symptoms. Most indistinguishable symptoms include restlessness, difficulty concentrating, irritability, sweating, trembling and feelings of impending doom. Patients should discuss this with their primary care physician for diagnoses and treatment.
About Diabetes
Diabetes mellitus is defined as a disorder where the body does not produce or use its own insulin properly, resulting in increased levels of glucose in the blood. These levels are influenced by being overweight, obesity and aging.
Glucose is a simple sugar that provides energy to most cells in the body. All cells except the brain, which only uses glucose as its energy source, can also use other energy sources.
After eating, carbohydrates are transformed to sugar (glucose). This sugar is digested and transformed by the small intestines to the blood stream. Any glucose that is not used is stored by the liver and skeletal muscles as a substance called glycogen. All excess is accumulated as fat.
Glycogen is used as an energy source between meals.