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If you have diabetes, monitoring your health can be a lot to manage: checking your blood sugar, making healthy food, finding time to be active, taking medicines, and going to doctors appointments. With all that, your feet might be the last thing on your mind.

Poorly controlled diabetes can cause damage to the nerves and blood vessels going to peoples feet, said Dr. Daniel Lamar, an internal medicine specialist with the 56th Medical Group at Luke Air Force Base in Glendale, Arizona. As a result, people can lose the sensation in their feet. This causes people to change the way they walk and may result in the development of sores on their feet that they dont feel.

Diabetes is the sixth leading cause of death in the United States, with more than 11 percent of the U.S. population having the disease, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

According to the National Institutes for Health, foot problems are common in people with diabetes. Checking and taking care of your feet every day can help lower your chances for diabetes-related foot problems. Managing your blood glucose levels can also help keep your feet healthy.

Due to nerve damage in feet, people can develop sores, which then can get infected and be very difficult to treat because of the damage to the blood vessels, according to Lamar. The damaged blood vessels cause decreased blood flow which makes it hard for the immune system to respond and makes it difficult to get high levels of antibiotics to the area of infection. As a result, people can end up with amputations.

When poorly controlled, Lamar notes that diabetes causes complications throughout the body. It can damage all nerve cells including peoples retinas. Diabetes is the most common cause of nontraumatic amputations in the U.S, and is one of the two most common causes of people going on dialysis. It can also cause people to go blind.

If you experience any of these symptoms, you should see your doctor right away:

Prevention is the best way to keep your feet healthy. Complications from diabetes are most associated with diabetes being poorly controlled. If a patient keeps their blood sugar under control, manages their weight, and has regular provider visits, it dramatically decreases the risk of long-term complications, said Rachel Perkins Garner, a disease management nurse at Luke Air Force Base.

Tips to maintain your feet include:

There are two types of diabetes, each with its own set of causes and treatments:

Lamar noted that if someone is not properly controlling their diabetes, they may be thirsty all the time and will urinate a lot. People with poorly controlled diabetes feel generally poorly.

According to the CDC, eating healthy, regular exercise and maintaining a healthy weight can help control your diabetes.

With over 130,000 Department of Defense beneficiaries worldwide affected with diabetes, according to Perkins Garner, the Defense Health Agency sees an urgency in combatting this chronic disease.

One example of this is the DODs focus on promoting and maintaining a healthy lifestyle. The U.S. Air Force has adopted Lifestyle and Performance Medicine to keep their airmen healthy.

According to Perkins Garner, Lifestyle medicine is an evidenced-based lifestyle therapeutic intervention which is based on six pillars: a whole-food, plant-predominant eating pattern, regular physical activity, restorative sleep, stress management, avoidance of risky substances and positive social connections. These interventions practiced, can prevent, treat, and often reverse chronic disease, such as diabetes.

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Monitor Your Diabetes and Health Daily One Step at a Time - Health.mil

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Home » Uncategorized » Monitor Your Diabetes and Health Daily One Step at a Time – Health.mil