Effects of Diabetes on the Eye

How are we doing today? The weekend is here and so far things have been running smoothly both on and off the blockchain. I do hope that things have been going great for you too my dear reader, the night is still young and we ought to get in the weekend mood already.

Anyway so as usual I am here to share some lessons about our eye and for our lesson for today I would be touching on some of the effects diabetes tend to have on the eye and how best we can go about protecting our eyes and saving our sight if we have diabetes or if we get diagnosed with one. I do hope you enjoy it.

It is a systemic condition of the body where the body either fails to produce enough insulin for the absorption of glucose into our tissues and cells or when the cells become resistant to insulin such that they still fail to take up the broken down sugar into themselves for usage and production of energy.

Just like the general principle of life goes, too much of anything is bad (i don't think too much money is bad though), sugar or glucose is good for the body especially in the function of energy production however when it becomes too much in the system and the system is not able to get it to where it ought to then a lot of bad things start to happen.

Diabetes is a serious condition and a canker for the world that world-class research and medicine are working on by the clock to combat. Now, because every single aspect of our body has blood vessels of a kind feeding it with energy when one has diabetes every single aspect of the human body or system suffers and one of these crucial organs is the eye.

When diabetes starts to affect the eye we term it as diabetic retinopathy and although the name retinopathy suggests things going on only within the eye, I must add that diabetes also affects all aspects of the physiology and anatomy of the eye.

So what happens? The sugar or glucose traveling through the bloodstream gets to the eye and because the vessels or arteries there are quite tiny, they tend to get lodged in them disrupting flow and energy availability to the retina and different parts of the eye.

The eye as it suffers tries to find ways around by creating new vessels which due to things not being done the way they ought to end up weaker than the normal vessels, bleed, and starts to cause all sorts of troubles to the eye. Our vision gets affected, cells within the eye start to die.

The cornea sensitivity keeps declining, our tear production is affected leading to dry eye syndrome and our lens becomes opacified as a result of the incomplete breakdown of the glucose and the by-products produced that tend to cause more harm than good to the lens.

This is known as diabetic cataract and the sad thing is that operating this would later on still cause opacities in the implanted intraocular lens that replaces it, lot times vision is not even improved because the retina is already in a bad condition and the eye's refractive status keeps changing such that your Optometrist doesn't get a stable corrective power to help you out with new lenses.

But diabetes is not a damnation that you will probably lose your sight and that nothing is going to work out well for you anymore, no. There are many patients I meet daily who are diabetic and are doing so well, especially with their eyes.

Because diabetes is a systemic condition, it cannot be tackled from the point of the eye or anyone organ that is affected, it has to be tackled from the root and that is managing your glucose level well. The first would be your diabetes medication or treatment. You need to be as religious with it as possible.

Avoid foods that your Physician may have advised against and do well to always have regular checks also. If possible have a test kit at home to check your glucose level every day or at regular intervals, do not deceive yourself by only doing well when you are about to go for a review, the joke would be on you and not your physician.

It is advisable that you quit some unhealthy habits like smoking that may make things worse for you and for you to pick up habits such as exercising or gyming to help keep you and your system in good shape and even boost your cells in terms of their function. Good eating habits too would go a long way to help you out.

Please note that you being able to take care of your condition systemically would automatically make things a whole lot better for your eye and any other organs that may have been affected.

Diabetes is manageable, its numerous effects on the eye can also be well managed but the most important thing to consider is your systemic treatment. And so do not wait for things to get out of hand before you make the efforts to make things better. As I always say, your health is your wealth. Good life ought to be lived well.