In 2011, Ryan Reed (1993, ), a stock-car racing driver who competes on NASCAR’s Xfinity Series circuit, was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at age 17.
Told he would be unable to race again, Reed found a way of treating his diabetes and racing.
To do this, he installed a drink system in his race car, along with a blood glucose monitor.
The monitor communicates with a wireless device attached to Reed’s stomach (for more about monitors, see the chapter “Taking Charge of Diabetes”), with the readout on the car’s dashboard, allowing him to keep track of his blood glucose levels.
If he needs adjustment, Reed receives the necessary insulin (or whatever he needs) during his pit stops.
He is one of two professional race-car drivers who have diabetes and has become a diabetes advocate, starting his own nonprofit foundation called Ryan’s Mission.
Who are some movie and television personalities with diabetes?
Many movie and television personalities, from about 1900 to the present, have or have had diabetes. Some of the more famous actors and actresses include the following:
• Mary Jane “Mae” West (1893, 1980), nicknamed “Diamond Lil,” was a popular actress, singer, and comedian in the 1940s and 1950s. She suffered from diabetes (type unknown) for 15 years before her death at age 87 (she had had a stroke that was thought to be a complication of her diabetes).
• Talk-show host Larry King (1933, ) had a major heart attack in 1987, after which he gave up smoking and changed his lifestyle. But even with the changes, and probably owing to a family history of the disease, he was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes in 1998.
• Actress Mary Tyler Moore (1936, 2017) was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes after being hospitalized with a miscarriage, when a blood test revealed a blood glucose level of 750. She was put on insulin therapy in her early thirties (while she was in the early years of The Mary Tyler Moore Show ). After that, she became a major spokesperson for the disease, serving as the international chairman of the JDRF (formerly Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation) for several years.
The late actress Mary Tyler Moore (shown here in 2001) struggled with type 1 diabetes for much of her life. She spent many years educating people about the disease as a spokeswoman.
• Actor Tom Hanks (1956, ) reported once that he had elevated blood glucose levels for years before he was definitely diagnosed with diabetes. He may have developed the disease because of yo-yo dieting to fill certain roles in his movies (for example, he gained 30 pounds (13.6 kilograms) and lost 50 pounds (22.7 kilograms) for A League of Their Own and Cast Away, respectively, among other roles that required weight changes). He made his diagnosis public in 2013 and has since spoken candidly about his disease in several interviews.
DIABETES’ EFFECTS ON ANIMALS
Do all animals experience diabetes?
No, not all animals get diabetes.
Those that do include pigs, apes, sheep, cats, dogs, and horses.
In particular, all mammals produce insulin and will develop what humans often refer to as diabetes (high blood glucose levels) if the beta cells in their pancreases are removed.
But in the case of animals that can develop diabetes-type problems, there are various classifications, usually depending on the species.
For example, veterinarians divide dog (canine) diabetes into insulin-deficiency diabetes and insulin-resistance diabetes, which are somewhat similar to human type 1 and type 2 diabetes, respectively.
In addition, female dogs can develop a canine form of gestational diabetes; other dogs can develop a form of autoimmune diabetes that is similar to a human’s latent autoimmune diabetes in adults (LADA).
Even cats are not immune, often developing feline diabetes that is similar to a human’s type 2 diabetes.
How do some dogs, and cats, help humans who have diabetes?
One of the more amazing talents of some animals, especially dogs and some cats, is knowing when their owner is experiencing a diabetic event. These “therapy dogs” (and some cats) often alert a person with diabetes that he or she will soon experience a diabetic episode. The reason for the ability is thought to be a dog’s powerful ability to smell: Many people with diabetes have a certain smell when blood glucose levels are too high.
Dogs can be trained to recognize when their owners are having a diabetic event; they can then alert others to the emergency.
Can cats develop diabetes?
Yes, cats can develop diabetes.
As with humans, diabetes is a common disease in cats, in which the cat’s body does not produce or does not use insulin properly (similar to human type 2 diabetes).
The insulin in cats is also produced in the pancreas and, as with humans, is responsible for regulating the flow of glucose from the bloodstream and to various cells in the body.
Also similar to humans, the classic signs of diabetes in cats are increased (and often ravenous) appetite, weight loss, increased thirst, and increased urination.
And as of this writing, there are treatments but no cure for feline diabetes.
Feline diabetes is generally divided into two types: insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM) and non-insulin-dependent (NIDDM) diabetes mellitus.
Statistically, half to three-quarters of diabetic cats have IDDM, which requires injections of insulin as soon as the disease is diagnosed.
The rest have NIDDM and can be treated with oral medications and diet, and some cats (especially if the diabetes is a result of being obese) may not need insulin months or years after the diagnoses once the obesity is controlled.
But if obesity or some other connected disorder is not a factor, the diabetes will probably not go away, and such cats will often eventually require insulin injections to control the disease.
Without treatment, a cat with diabetes will have a shorter lifespan.
In addition, other related disorders will cause the cat to become progressively weaker, including from diabetic neuropathy; several fatal conditions may develop, including ketoacidosis.
What are some risk factors associated with diabetes in cats?
The risk factors for diabetes in cats are very similar to human diabetes risk factors. According to the Cornell University Feline Health Center, risk factors for cats include obesity (the biggest risk and most often in older cats), age, gender (male cats are more commonly afflicted than females), chronic pancreatitis, medications (such as corticosteroids), and concurrent disease or infections.
Can dogs develop diabetes?
Yes, as with most animals that develop the disease, diabetes in a dog is a disorder of carbohydrate, protein, and fat metabolism (how the body digests and uses food, mainly for energy) caused by an absolute or relative insulin deficiency. The process of metabolism is largely dependent on a sufficient amount of insulin in the body, and if a dog is deficient, it may develop diabetes. There are several symptoms of the disease, including weight loss, increase in urination, a change in appetite (eating more or eating less), drinking more water, fruity-smelling breath, dehydration, lethargy, and often urinary tract infections.
How do smaller and larger animals differ when it comes to diabetes?
Besides cats and dogs, many other small animals, mammals, mostly, can develop their own forms of diabetes.
But there are differences.
For example, ferrets develop insulinoma, or the opposite of what is common in humans with diabetes (lack of insulin).
Afflicted ferrets have too much insulin because their beta cells are out of control, causing blood glucose levels to drop too low (hypoglycemia), which often causes nodules to form on the pancreas.
Symptoms can often be inactivity (most healthy ferrets are active unless they are asleep), vomiting, drooling, and loss of appetite and weight.
Larger animals, on the other hand, are less apt to develop diabetes than smaller animals, but diabetes has been reported in cattle, pigs, sheep, horses, and bison.
Why are dolphins of interest to diabetes researchers?
R esearchers are interested in the bottlenose dolphin as that animal can have what could be called type 2 diabetes but with a big difference.
Bottlenose dolphins can turn their type of diabetes “on and off” in a process that helps them keep enough glucose in their bodies even though they eat sugar-sparse diets (mostly high-protein fish and little sugar).
The researchers believe this on-and-off process may have to do with the animals’ brains.
Humans have relatively large brains as compared with their size, and dolphins are second only to humans in the ratio of brain to body size.
In humans, it takes a great deal of sugar (glucose) to keep the brain functioning.
Thus, researchers believe dolphins may have evolved their on-and-off diabetic-like states as an adaptation to maintain glucose for their bigger brains.
This is only a theory, so more studies are needed.
The Handy Diabetes Answer Book
TYPE 1 DIABETES
BLOOD GLUCOSE LEVELS
How is a person’s blood glucose level measured?
Blood glucose levels are measured with four major tests, including the fasting plasma blood glucose, random plasma blood glucose, oral glucose tolerance, and glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) tests. The first three tests measure a person’s blood glucose in terms of milligrams per deciliter (seen as mg/dl or mg/dL), whereas the HbA1c (or A1c) test is measured in percentages.
What are considered to be “normal” blood glucose levels?
Although everyone’s blood glucose levels change during the day, when a person’s blood glucose levels are measured, there are some standards advocated by health care professionals. The following chart shows the target ranges most health care professionals use to make a diagnosis of diabetes or no diabetes, based on four types of tests (for more details about these tests, see the chapter “Taking Charge of Diabetes”).
What are considered general blood glucose level targets for a person with diabetes?
Although there are exceptions to every rule, the following lists the general blood glucose level targets for a person who has diabetes (note: these numbers may not apply to all people with diabetes):
• Fasting or before-meal glucose level, 90 to 130 mg/dl
• After-meal glucose (or two hours after the start of the meal) level, greater than (>) 180 mg/dl
• Bedtime glucose, 100 to 140 mg/dl
Diabetes Diagnosis Target Ranges
Test Result Is
Fasting blood glucose
Random blood glucose
Oral glucose tolerance
HbA1c
Normal
≤ 100 mg/dl
≤ 140 mg/dl
< 6.0%
Impaired fasting glucose
≥ 100 mg/dl and ≤ 126 mg/dl
Impaired glucose tolerance
a 2-hour glucose level is ≤ 140 mg/dl and ≥ 200 mg/dl
Diabetes
≤ 125 mg/dl on two consecutive blood tests
≤ 200 mg/dl and have diabetes symptoms
A 2-hour glucose level is ≤ 200 mg/dl
> 6.5%
*These test-result numbers sometimes change because of new discoveries in the study of diabetes, and some do not apply to all people with diabetes.
Have standard levels for blood glucose levels changed over the years?
A main goal for a person with or without diabetes is to maintain certain blood glucose levels that sustain his or her health. And over the past two decades, the numbers that indicate “normal,” “prediabetes,” and “diabetes” have changed, mainly because of advancements in medical research and technology.
TYPE 1 (OR TYPE ONE OR TYPE I) DIABETES
What are the early warning signs of type 1 diabetes?
There are several warning signs of type 1 diabetes. It is thought to be caused by the immune system attacking and destroying the body’s own pancreatic cells (those that produce the necessary insulin for the body). The following lists some of the traditional type 1 diabetes warning signs:
• The onset is apparently sudden, although for many people (especially children) it may seem to occur slowly as some of the symptoms mimic other conditions.
• The person urinates frequently, as the body tries to rid itself of the excessive amounts of blood glucose.