Controlled diabetes, happy vacations

controlled diabetes, happy vacations

By: Dr. in C. Manuel González Ortiz, Friday, July 18, 2008

Doctor of Science and Medical Researcher BP of the Medical Research Unit in Clinical Epidemiology of the Hospital de Specialties National Medical Center of the West, Guadalajara.

Summer holidays arrived and millions of people will spend some days away from home.

This period of relaxation allows families to bring new places and live different emotions, but those who live with type 2 diabetes mellitus (DMT2) know that it is also a period in which you have to be alert.

In Mexico there are more than ten million people who have the disease and can develop a work and/or study perfectly normal because they have acquired new healthy habits that allow them to control their sugar levels.

This regime includes four large pillars that can be neglected during vacation: care in food, physical activity, attachment to medications and emotions control.

Details as simple as walking barefoot in the sand, eating in a street post or having dislikes in the travel plan, generate complications that fill the medical offices once the holiday period is finished.

The fact of going to another environment and temporarily adopting a different lifestyle, requires the diabetic patient to make an additional effort to stay within the mentioned regime.

The burns of a diabetic foot due to the heat of the sand can be serious, because patients have little sensitivity and do not realize that they are mistreating their tissues;The same happens when they go to trips where they make long walks that can hurt at their feet without realizing it.

avoids lack of control

Other complications can be generated for lack of control or medication management.

Because the patient assumes that in the place he will visit he will find suitable foods and the medications that he daily uses daily.

I tell you that diabetes is an acceptance and commitment disease to have it controlled.

Only to achieve this also requires proper management of medications, based on medical recommendations.

My patients tell me how difficult it is to maintain the daily take of the pills that one prescribes them, so when they go on vacation, they are easy to forget about their taking.

There are currently oral medications that, through the combination in a single glymepirid and metformin (glimetal) table, allows the patient with DMT2 to have a greater attachment to treatment, which together with adequate feeding and physical activity, they provide adequate metabolic controland delays the appearance of disease complications, as well as raising its quality of life.

take care of emotions

One more aspect to consider, is the part of emotions, it is very important to be attentive in the management of moods, because while the patient is responsible for 100 percent of their diet, physical activity and medication taking, the managementStress does not depend 100 percent of them, because we are within a society where there are numerous mobile factors that can cause emotional mismatches, such as traffic, trip schedules or unforeseen events in the services that are hired.

to take into account

The recommendation is to rest, relax, but not get away from the treatment guidelines suggested by your treating doctor.

Practical tips:

* Go with your doctor previously to guide you and do a medical exam.

* Take with you some medical document that identifies you as a diabetic and specifies your treatment.

* Don't forget to carry yourmedications and glucose meter.

* Properly control the intake of carbohydrate foods.

* Do not abuse alcohol.

* Use comfortable footwear, preferably without seams.

* Never walk barefoot.

* If the travel journey is prolonged, try to walk a few minutes at least every two hours.

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