How People With Diabetes Can Lower Stroke Risk

After spending nearly two decades trying to manage her Type 2 diabetes, Agnes Czuchlewski landed in the emergency room in 2015, with news that she’d just experienced a heart attack. She also learned that she had metabolic syndrome, a cluster of conditions that includes diabetes but also brings higher risk of heart disease and stroke. “Because I needed to lose quite a bit of weight when I was first diagnosed, I was focused on the number I saw on the scale, and then on my blood-sugar numbers,” recalls Czuchlewski, 68, who lives in New York City. “I didn’t realize other numbers came into play, like blood pressure and cholesterol. That came as a shock. It made me realize that there was more I needed to get under control than I thought.” [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] According to the American Heart Association (AHA), people with diabetes have double the risk of stroke compared to those without diabetes. They also tend to develop heart disease or have a stroke at an earlier age, and the AHA estimates that an American adult with diabetes is hospitalized for stroke every two minutes. The connection is related to how the body handles blood glucose to make energy, says Dr. Deepak Gulati, a neurologist at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center’s Comprehensive Stroke Center. When food is broken down into glucose, it uses the hormone insulin to enter cells, but those with Type 1 diabetes lack the insulin needed for this pro...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized Disease healthscienceclimate Source Type: news