Type 1 diabetes

Diabetes is a lifelong condition that causes a person’s blood glucose (sugar) level to become too high.

The hormone insulin – produced by the pancreas – is responsible for controlling the amount of glucose in the blood.

There are two main types of diabetes:

Type 1 – where the pancreas doesn’t produce any insulin Type 2 – where the pancreas doesn’t produce enough insulin or the body’s cells don’t react to insulin

This topic is about type 1 diabetes.

Read more about type 2 diabetes

Another type of diabetes, known as gestational diabetes, occurs in some pregnant women and tends to disappear following birth.

It’s very important for diabetes to be diagnosed as soon as possible, because it will get progressively worse if left untreated.

You should therefore visit your GP if you have symptoms, which include feeling thirsty, passing urine more often than usual and losing weight unexpectedly (see the list below for more diabetes symptoms).

Symptoms

The symptoms of diabetes occur because the lack of insulin means that glucose is high but isn’t used by your muscles as fuel for energy.

When blood glucose is high, glucose is lost in your urine and you may become dehydrated.

Typical symptoms include:

feeling very thirsty passing urine more often than usual, particularly at night feeling very tired all the time weight loss and loss of muscle bulk persistent infections such as thrush

The symptoms of type 1 diabetes usually develop very quickly in young people (over a few hours or days). In adults, the symptoms often take longer to develop (a few days or weeks).

Read more about the symptoms of type 1 diabetes


The symptoms of type 1 diabetes should disappear when you start taking insulin and you get the condition under control.

The main symptoms of diabetes are:

feeling very thirsty urinating more frequently than usual, particularly at night feeling very tired weight loss and loss of muscle bulk itchiness around the genital area, or regular bouts of thrush (a yeast infection) blurred vision caused by the lens of your eye changing shape

Vomiting or heavy, deep breathing can also occur at a later stage. This is a dangerous sign and requires immediate admission to hospital for treatment.