Diabetes mellitis is a chronic disease, so learning how to treat it is imperative. Because lifestyle, age, and a variety of other factors affects how the disease affects the body, treatment is likely to be highly personalized. Monitoring blood glucose levels is an important part of proper treatment for diabetes mellitus.
Diet and exercise are key. The diabetes diet is high in fiber, low in fat and sugar intake dependent upon the type of diabetes mellitus being experienced. The diet is very similar to any healthy diet, however the timing of the meals becomes more important as maintaining consistent levels of sugar in the blood is vital. Similarly, exercise is recommended for all, but for diabetes mellitus patients it has the added benefit of lowering blood sugar levels. Also, fat makes cells less responsive to insulin, making it a large factor in Type 2 diabetes. Both diet and exercise can help lose weight and make it much easier to maintain proper blood glucose levels.
Insulin is also used as a diabetes treatment. Insulin is a hormone that is needed for removal of glucose from the blood, and is low or not correctly utilized by the body by diabetics. Injections or other methods of increasing insulin in a diabetic helps regulate proper blood sugar by encouraging the body to remove the sugar from the blood.
Another option may be an oral anti-diabetic drug to help regulate insulin levels and response. These are mostly used by Type 2 diabetics and include drugs to raise the amount of insulin being produced by the pancreas, drugs to make the cells more sensitive to insulin in the system, and drugs to slow the absorption of glucose from the digestive tract. The specific combination used will be dependent upon the health and circumstances of the patient.