Conditions
Diabetes Mellitus
Also Known As Diabetes
Metabolic Disease
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A chronic metabolic disorder in which the body either does not produce enough insulin (Type 1, an autoimmune destruction of the pancreas's insulin-producing cells) or does not effectively use the insulin it produces (Type 2, insulin resistance with relative insulin deficiency), resulting in persistently elevated blood glucose. Left uncontrolled it damages blood vessels and nerves over years, raising the risk of cardiovascular disease, kidney failure, blindness and limb amputation. The isolation of insulin in 1921 to 1922 transformed what had been, for Type 1 patients especially, a fatal diagnosis into a manageable chronic condition.
Facts
Condition Classchronic, metabolic, endocrine 1 First DescribedDate is approximate (circa); Aretaeus of Cappadocia's exact dates are uncertain, generally placed in the first or second century CE. He coined the term diabetes, Greek for siphon, describing the disease's excessive urination. First Described (Era)The earliest known description of a disease consistent with diabetes appears in the Egyptian Ebers Papyrus, circa 1550 BCE, noting a condition marked by excessive urination. The Latin mellitus, honey-sweet, was added by the English physician Thomas Willis in 1675 after he noted the sweetness of the urine. 2 PrevalenceAn estimated 830 million adults worldwide were living with diabetes in 2022, according to World Health Organization data. 3 Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
Treated By
Insulin therapy manages blood glucose levels; it is not a cure. Frederick Banting and Charles Best's 1921 to 1922 isolation of insulin at the University of Toronto is the founding discovery this treatment rests on.
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