How many of you bloggers are diabetic or know someone who is diabetic? All of us occasionally have a sweet tooth, but over time this can develop into a serious condition, Type II diabetes.
Type II diabetes really means that your body doesn’t react normally to you eating sugar. When you eat, this causes a rise in sugar (glucose) in your bloodstream, which is normal. However, the way a diabetic body reacts to sugar is abnormal. Usually your pancreas produces insulin into your bloodstream which retrieves that glucose and feeds it to your muscles, heart, brain etc. BUT in a type II diabetic person this streamlined system runs amuck. The insulin doesn’t pull out the glucose from your blood and you can get hyperglycemic, which is a fancy way of saying too much sugar in your blood. The can cause multiple systems to slowly start to malfunction over years of dealing with diabetes. The nervous system in your feet is most commonly the one that starts to go bad first.
You might feel little pins, burning, or the sensation of needles on the bottoms of your feet or a the tips of your toes at first. Then it might start to intensify and become more frequent. It will eventually progress into feeling unsteady or your shoes are too loose when walking. This is because slowly your perception nerves are dying because of the high sugar in the blood system. That’s why we recommend that all of our diabetic patients come in and get a diabetic foot risk assessment and to get a new pair of diabetic shoes yearly. These special shoes are made only for diabetic patients. They offer a larger toe box to protect your toes from getting stubbed and it also allows for a deeper heel depth to allow room for an orthotic to help realign you in your gait. Also there are special features of the shoes that allow the lacing to be more formfitting to your foot!
If you or someone you know might be interested in discussing more about your diabetic foot and ankle health risk assessment with me or another one of your knowledgeable podiatrists, come on into the office of Frederick Foot & Ankle. We would be more than happy to schedule an appointment, at either of our locations in Frederick, MD or Urbana, MD. We can set you up the proper evaluation and treatment plan to help you relieve your foot and ankle pains; don’t hesitate visiting your local podiatrists! We hope to see you this upcoming week to get your diabetic shoes for the summer!
Add a Comment