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Living with Diabetes

Diet, Exercise And New Tools For Coping

Chris Quan was diagnosed with diabetes about 40 years ago, a time when it was a scary disease for children. Quan remembers being scolded by a doctor and feeling like it was her fault that her body wasn't producing enough insulin. She also recalls boiling syringes and sharpening the needles before giving herself an insulin injection. Lancets looked like razor blades. Information was scarce.

"When I grew up with diabetes, there was only one book to read, and it was by some drug company," recalls Quan, of Oakland.

Luckily for Quan, now in her 50s, and the 18.2 million American adults and children who cope with diabetes, times have changed. Now, there are video and computer games that explain the disease for children.The Internet provides a wealth of information, and there are stacks of books available. Web sites automatically adjust recipes for diabetics.

Perhaps most encouraging, though, are the improved products for treating diabetes, including: Home-monitoring kits, new oral medications that improve how the body uses insulin, vacuum lancets and disposable syringes. There are pumps that administer insulin, and a recent development includes insulin inhalers. Still, the disease is taking a toll.

There are approximately 60,000 Alameda County residents diagnosed with diabetes, and another 30,000 who are unaware they have it, said Brenda Rueda-Yamashita, director of the Alameda County Public Health Department's diabetes program. With diabetes, the body doesn't produce or properly use insulin, a hormone needed to convert sugar, starches and other food into energy. Both genetics and environmental factors such as obesity and lack of exercise appear to play roles, although the cause isn't known. Often, there aren't symptoms.

"Sometimes when you don't feel good, you get used to not feeling good," says Rueda-Yamashita. At least another 30,000 people in Alameda County have pre-diabetes, a condition that can serve as a warning, she says.

Pre-diabetes occurs most often in people who develop Type 2 diabetes, which afflicts 90 percent of the people with the disease. The other 10 percent have Type 1 diabetes, which typically develops in childhood. Type 2 diabetes, once considered an adult disease, is seen more regularly in teens and even children now, according to Ann Doherty, a nurse and certified diabetes educator at Alta Bates Summit Medical Center's Diabetes Center.

"We definitely are seeing more and more people (with diabetes) and their brothers and their children," she says. "It's really an epidemic throughout the family. That's really changing the face of diabetes. Our classes used to be a lot of retired people. Now, we see a lot of people in their 40s and teens. With Type 2, that used to be unheard of. We have had 12-year-olds with Type 2."

Living with diabetes means eating a balanced diet and exercising, which is also good advice for those hoping to avoid the disease. Quan, now a dietician at the Diabetes Center at Alta Bates, has learned life can be good with diabetes. She loves cooking East Indian food and has found that better sugar substitutes help her make a great apple pie.

"It's more positive now," says Quan. "With diabetes, you become good in science, and you learn how to cook."