Educating Myself
Friday, November 20th, 2009While I think that my daughter will be getting the best care possible for her newly diagnosed Type 1 Diabetes (Juvenile Diabetes), I need to keep myself educated on as many aspects as I can to be able to help her until she becomes continuing more comfortable managing her own care.
One of the biggest issues she continues to face is dealing with her own family members ignorance of the “type” of diabetes she has. She has even found herself being challenged about the medications her doctor’s have prescribed, the number of times she needs to test her blood sugars and even what tests she had done. Some of these challenges stem from her father’s attitude towards her asthma and the care she needed when she was younger. To this day, he continues to deny that she has asthma. Does he now deny she has diabetes?
Two of the lab results that I have been trying to get a better understanding of are her C-Peptide (which is 1.0) and her Glutamic Acid Decarboxylase Antibodies (which is 250.0). According to the Vanderbilt results the normal range for C-Peptide is 0.9 to 7.1. The normal range for the GAD antibody is < 5.1
Both of these results are what is used to diagnose Type 1 Diabetes. They are also part of the tests that were run and are being rerun to determine if Megan is a good candidate to the DEFEND drug study.
Next week Megan will have two Mixed Meal Tolerance Test’s run. These will to determine if her beta cells are still making insulin. To be able to join this study, she will need to have some beta cells that are still making a certain amount of insulin. More for me to learn about.
