DIABETES: Fast Track Is Wrong Track

BY:MYRA DEMBROW

If you're obese, having diabetes is more likely to make you critically ill or even kill you. So claims a study of more than 15,000 people conducted by the University of Kentucky Chandler Hospital and the Emory University School of Medicine.

Researchers found that obese people who did not have diabetes suffered acute organ failure at about the same rate as people whose body-mass index was at a healthy level. But those with diabetes, no matter their weight, were three times more likely to suffer acute organ failure and three times more likely to die from any cause than people who didn't have diabetes.

Those findings, reported in the September 24, 2006, issue of Critical Care, underscore the importance of managing diabetes and maintaining good hygiene during even the simplest of tasks. Considering that, the American Academy of Family Physicians offers these tips on how to safely check your blood sugar levels accurately:

• Maintain a regular testing schedule
• Wash hands thoroughly with warm water and antibacterial soap before starting
• Have all equipment ready—including glucose meter, alcohol pads, test strips and finger lancets-and be sure the lancets are sterile and that test strips have not expired
• Cleanse the area to be pricked with alcohol and let it dry before pricking the cleansed area with the lancet and squeezing a drop of blood onto the test strip
• Follow the directions on your glucose meter to ensure a proper reading
• Record the reading in a notebook
• Follow your doctor's instructions if the reading is too low or too high