does type 1 diabetes weaken the immune system?
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When you have type 1 diabetes, something goes wrong with your immune system. It destroys beta cells in your pancreas responsible for making a hormone called insulin. Insulin allows glucose -- or sugar -- to get into your cells, where it's turned into energy.
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Type 1 diabetes is a disease in which the body does not make enough insulin to control blood sugar levels. Type 1 diabetes was previously called insulin-dependent diabetes or juvenile diabetes. During digestion, food is broken down into basic components.
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And because the cells end up starving for energy, people with type 1 diabetes are often hungry and have trouble keeping up their weight. They may also be weak, irritable, tired, and troubled by an upset stomach.
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Introduction. Type 1 diabetes (T1D) is an organ-specific autoimmune disease characterized by the selective destruction of pancreatic β-cells.
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Type 1 diabetes definition In people with type 1 diabetes, cells in the pancreas that make insulin are destroyed, and the body is unable to make insulin. Insulin is a hormone that helps your body's cells use glucose for energy. Your body gets glucose from the food you eat.
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People with diabetes are more susceptible to developing infections, as high blood sugar levels can weaken the patient's immune system defenses. 1﻿ In addition, some diabetes-related health issues, such as nerve damage and reduced blood flow to the extremities, increase the body's vulnerability to infection.
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May 2, 2007 -- Men with type 1 diabetes may have more DNA damage in their sperm, possibly hampering fertility, a preliminary study shows. The study was small and doesn't prove that type 1 diabetes causes male infertility.
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Life stress can weaken immune functioning. Stress hormones released into the bloodstream by the adrenal glands can suppress the activity of specific immune system cells, increasing the likelihood of illness. People's attempts to cope with stressors sometimes lead them to behave in ways that impair immunity.
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Many tools and tips can help you control your type 1 diabetes. But left unchecked, it can affect several organs, including your brain. Big spikes and dips in blood sugar levels are linked to depression, shortened attention spans, and slowed reaction times, both physically and mentally.
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Viral Trigger for Type 1 Diabetes. The most popular hypothesis circulating within and beyond the scientific community is that viral infections enhance or elicit autoimmune disorders such as type 1 diabetes. Indeed, viruses can injure β-cells and have been isolated in pancreatic tissues from diabetic patients.
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Over time, type 1 diabetes complications can affect major organs in your body, including heart, blood vessels, nerves, eyes and kidneys. Maintaining a normal blood sugar level can dramatically reduce the risk of many complications. Eventually, diabetes complications may be disabling or even life-threatening.
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Conclusions. Type 1 diabetes compromises female fertility, even before it is diagnosed. Associated hyperthyroidism further reduces fertility. Blood glucose and thyroid function surveillance in infertile females may allow for an early diagnosis of type 1 diabetes and associated thyroid disease.
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Most likely, it is an autoimmune disorder. This is a condition that occurs when the immune system mistakenly attacks and destroys healthy body tissue. With type 1 diabetes, an infection or another trigger causes the body to mistakenly attack the cells in the pancreas that make insulin.
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Uncontrolled type 1 diabetes can lead to a life-threatening complication called diabetic ketoacidosis. Without insulin, cells cannot take in glucose. A lack of glucose in cells prompts the liver to try to compensate by releasing more glucose into the blood, and blood sugar can become extremely high.
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Long-term high blood sugar levels in people with type 1 diabetes appears to result in chronic inflammation, researchers say, which can impair organs, nerves and blood vessels.
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It is believed that in people with type 1 diabetes, the body's own immune system attacks and kills the beta cells in the pancreas that produce insulin. Without insulin, the body cannot control blood sugar, and people can suffer from dangerously high blood sugar levels (called hyperglycemia).
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Type 1 diabetes in children is a condition in which your child's body no longer produces an important hormone (insulin). Your child needs insulin to survive, so the missing insulin needs to be replaced with injections or with an insulin pump.