High blood sugar is like a slow knife, which can damage the heart, kidneys, eyes, nerves and other organs and tissues little by little. Long-term blood sugar exceeds the standard, and the body is like soaking in high-concentration sugar water.
Not only that, a recent paper published in the top international journal "Nature" also found that high blood sugar can suppress the combat effectiveness of lung immune tissues, making people more susceptible to viral infections.
"Life Times" combines this research and expert opinions to tell you what changes high blood sugar has brought to various organs.
High blood sugar "drags" the lungs' immunity
The immune sentinels of the lungs, dendritic cells, have the ability to capture, process, and present pathogen antigens, which can be carried to the lungs to drain lymph nodes, awaken T cells, and help us fight off the flu.
This time, scientists from the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel found that "blood sugar" has a key regulatory effect on lung dendritic cells, and hyperglycemia will lead to changes in the appearance of dendritic cells, thereby causing immune dysfunction and weakening the immune resistance of hyperglycemic mice to respiratory infections.
In mouse experiments, the research team found that type 1 or type 2 diabetic mice had higher lung viral load and higher mortality rate after infection with pathogens such as influenza viruses compared with non-diabetic mice.
The use of insulin supplementation therapy to lower blood sugar can help improve viral clearance and survival, improve immune response, and control lung damage in influenza-infected diabetic mice.
The research team used single-cell RNA sequencing technology to find that the cell activity of these lung dendritic cells did not change in the high-glucose environment, but the expression of genes related to antigen presentation was down-regulated, the antigen presentation ability was reduced, and the ability to induce T cell immune activation was inhibited.
Overall, this study is the first to reveal the mechanism by which hyperglycemia is more susceptible to viral respiratory infections, and "lung dendritic cells" are a key link between hyperglycemia and influenza susceptibility.
High blood sugar allows the organs to soak in sugar water
Blood sugar is always linked to metabolism. Long-term hyperglycemia damages the body, like "soaking internal organs in sugar water", and a series of chronic complications will occur.
blood vessel
The blood vessels that transport sugar bear the brunt, and under the constant attack of the glycation end products, the inner layer of the wall of the small blood vessel is destroyed, and the glycoprotein is deposited inside, making the thickness of the tube wall much higher than that of ordinary people.
eye
Many diabetic patients have worse and worse eyesight because of problems with the small blood vessels in the retina, first blocked, oozing blood, and then nerve hypoxia, blood vessel rupture, and even the entire retina peeling off.
kidney
The glomeruli is actually a network of capillaries, and if the blood sugar exceeds the standard for a long time, the glomeruli will be one less if the glomeruli is bad, and finally you can only rely on dialysis.
Mind and brain
Large blood vessels will also slowly have problems, and coronary heart disease and cerebrovascular disease will come to the door one after another. In addition, diabetic macrovascular lesions are often diffuse, blocked everywhere, and several stents should be placed in severe cases.
nerve
Neuropathy in diabetic patients has a variety of symptoms, depending on what the damaged nerve is. Some people feel that there are ants crawling on their arms, some people feel like they have been pricked by needles in their legs, and some people have bad nerves that regulate their heartbeat and blood pressure, and suddenly their heart rate and blood pressure will soar, and they can even fall headlong when they get up.
immunity
A high-sugar environment suppresses the immune system while nourishing a variety of microbes, creating a tricky problem: it's easy to get infected, and if it does, it can be severe. Problems such as cold turning into pneumonia and tooth extraction causing sepsis are more likely to occur in diabetics.
Feet
Diabetic foot is due to various reasons superimposed, resulting in small wounds on the foot that are difficult to heal, coupled with microbial infection, the wound becomes larger and larger, and eventually the foot ulcers and necrosis.
Diabetic foot is an important cause of disability and one of the most serious and costly chronic complications.
High blood sugar throws out 7 signals
When blood sugar is high, it is often not painful or itchy, but the bad thing is that its destruction of the body does not stop for a moment.
However, there are still some clues that can indicate abnormal blood sugar. When the blood sugar level is more pronounced, the typical "three more and one less" symptoms will appear. Always remember to check your blood sugar when you have the following signs.
1. Drink more
I often feel dry and want to drink water, and the amount and frequency of water drinking is higher than before.
2. Eat more
Hunger is often felt and will soon be hungry again soon after eating.
3 Polyuria
There is a significant increase in the frequency of urination.
4 Low weight loss
On the premise of not deliberately controlling weight, weight loss is relatively fast, and in severe cases, there will even be obvious emaciation.
5. Itchy skin
Elevated blood sugar stimulates the nerves at the skin endings, which can cause itchy skin. In addition, high blood sugar can also damage the autonomic nerves, making the skin abnormally dry due to reduced sweating.
6. Darkening of skin folds
Velvety pigmentation in skin folds, most commonly on the neck, armpits, and groin, is often a sign of prediabetes.
7. Blurred vision
This is often a sign of a lesion of the optic nerve or small blood vessels in the eye, and don't take it for granted that it's just a vision problem.
Sugar control, eating is an important part
To control blood sugar, you need to work diet and exercise. Li Guangwei, director of the Endocrinology and Cardiovascular Disease Center of Fuwai Cardiovascular Hospital, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, summarized a "500111" sugar control rule for everyone.
5: Exercise 5 days a week
Half an hour a day is sufficient for high-intensity sports such as playing ball and swimming, while jogging, cycling and other high-intensity sports are light-intensity and can be appropriately extended.
0: No sweetened drinks
Sugar-sweetened beverages can exacerbate insulin resistance and abnormal glucose and lipid metabolism. If you want to drink a drink, you can choose tea, black coffee, low-fat milk, etc.
0: No more food after dinner
Dinner is best arranged at 18~20 o'clock to ensure that the food in the stomach is basically digested before going to bed. The order of eating vegetables first, then meat, and then staple foods is more friendly to blood sugar after meals, and at the same time, chew slowly and eat for no less than 20 minutes.
1: Obese people lose one or two staple foods per meal
The energy provided by carbohydrates in the diet should account for 50%~65% of the total energy. People who are overweight in pre-glucose (blood sugar that has exceeded the standard but have not yet been diagnosed with diabetes) can reduce one or two (50 grams) of staple foods per meal, which is equivalent to a reduction of 500 kilocalories.
1: Consume at least 1 pound of vegetables every day
Vegetables, especially leafy greens, are rich in nutrients and low in calories, making them the preferred food for people with excessive blood sugar. The daily intake of vegetables should reach one catty, and the amount should be greater than that of meat, and the varieties of vegetables and fruits per day are better in 4~6 kinds.
1: Eat out at most once a week
When eating out, try to order steamed and stewed vegetables and fish, and choose less red meat. You can ask for less oil, salt, and sugar when making dishes, and it is best to eat until you are seven or eight minutes full. ▲
Editor of this issue: Zheng Ronghua
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