How to quickly screen for diabetic risk – what tests are important for diabetics? If you watch TV, you’re likely to see commercials about prescription medications for diabetes.  These advertisements depict a scene that many want – happy, healthy, and functional.  If you close your eyes and listen to the commercials, you’ll find that a significant amount of information is provided at the end about risks of taking the medication.  Try it!

With so many people living with diabetes, the term is used so often that we either think that we will never get this, or that if we do there are many medications that will keep it under control.  But what we can’t picture are all the risks – blindness, Alzheimer’s disease, amputation, debilitating heart attacks/strokes, weight gain, and the financial repercussions are among the many risks of having diabetes.  If you have diabetes and get to the point where you need to be on insulin, these risks increase even more.  Medications will not stop the disease process or reverse the damage.

Many of us may know our weight or our last blood pressure reading, but most of us do now know our fasting insulin, our vitamin D levels, or what type of cholesterol we have (i.e. the good type/quality or bad type/quality).

If you want to know your risk for […]