Your blood sugar levels are carefully controlled by your body. Abnormally high blood glucose levels can damage your blood vessels, eyes and kidneys. Chronically high blood glucose concentrations are often a sign of diabetes mellitus, a condition that is caused by problems with the production or utilization of the pancreatic hormone insulin.
Carbohydrates and Insulin
When you consume foods with carbohydrates, your digestive tract breaks them down into sugars and then converts these sugars into glucose, resulting in an increase in blood glucose levels, Wisc-Online.com explains. Glucose in the blood is your body's preferred fuel source and a jump in blood glucose levels stimulates the pancreas to produce a hormone known as insulin. Insulin keeps your blood glucose levels from getting too high.
Insulin Mechansim
The main effect of insulin is to lower allow your body to take up the extra glucose in your blood to burn for energy, Colorado State University explains. Insulin primarily affects you liver, muscle and fat cells. In order for these cells to take up glucose, special proteins, known as glucose transporters, must be used to pull the glucose out of the blood and to move across cell membranes into the cells. Insulin stimulates the production of these glucose transporters.
Insulin Disorders
Diabetes is a condition marked by elevated blood glucose levels as a result of problems with insulin. One form of diabetes, known as type 1 diabetes, is caused by the immune system attacking and killing the cells in the pancreas that synthesize and secrete insulin. Type 2 diabetes, on the other hand, is caused by your liver, muscle and fat cells becoming resistant to the effects of insulin, which means that they do not respond as efficiently to insulin.
Diabetes Treatments
Most treatments for diabetes hinge on lowering blood glucose levels and they focus on insulin. If you have type 1 diabetes or severe type 2 diabetes, insulin injections may be necessary to supplement or replace insulin in your body. There are also oral medications for type 2 diabetes that either increase insulin production or make your cells more responsive to insulin. Many people with type 2 diabetes are overweight and losing weight can also allow your body to respond more efficiently to insulin.
