Chances are, if you found this website you already know a little something, or two, about diabetes. But maybe, like me, you are now expected to inform the people around you and I really have struggled with this for many years.

I’ve found diabetes is not easy to explain and it usually requires more than a short sentence, which means people's eyes glaze over and you lose them before you get to the "good" stuff. But recently, I’ve stumbled upon an explanation that seems to engage people more and they start asking for more detailed information - I wrote about that experience in more detail here.

I also thought I would include information about other types of diabetes that might be helpful to know about too.

** Disclosure - I am not a healthcare professional and my explanations are non scientific and non medical but I have linked websites if you want to delve into a more in depth explanation such as Diabetes Canada's website.

What is Diabetes?

Diabetes happens when the process of turning food into fuel is broken. Our bodies use food as fuel, or energy, to breath, blink, grow, regenerate, live, etc.

It does this by turning that food into glucose (not sugar) which travels to our cells, where the “insulin” key unlocks the cell door and lets the glucose inside to turn into energy.

The piece of the Food to Fuel process that is broken is the Insulin “key”: the keys are either all dead or they are all sick and unable to do what they need to do.

If diabetes isn’t diagnosed and treated the result is fatal.

Image from Diabetes Ireland’s Pete the Pancreas booklet

Here’s one of the many medical explanations which talks about blood vessels and nerves, stored glucose, etc.

Types of Diabetes

There are a bunch of different types of diabetes, my last count was 9. Yes 9!! You can find out about those types here on Diabetes UK's website.

TYPE 1 DIABETES

Type 1 diabetes is classified when all or most of the insulin “keys” have died. For some unknown reason, our immune system goes "terminator" on our insulin making cells and wipes them all out.

The only medicine to treat type 1 diabetes is to inject or infuse insulin, however, type 1 diabetes does not have exclusivity over insulin: many other types of diabetes require insulin therapy also.

About 5% to 10% of people with diabetes have type 1 and for a long time it was thought that most people got it as children or young adults but through very detailed research we now know that just as many adults are diagnosed with type 1.

For the more medical explanation of type 1 diabetes click here.

TYPE 1.5 / LADA (LATENT AUTOIMMUNE DIABETES IN ADULTS)

LADA is very much like type 1 diabetes but it tends to occur in adults and the symptoms tend to come on slower. It is very often mistaken for type 2 diabetes.

Like other forms of type 1 diabetes, people with LADA require insulin injections to normalise their blood glucose levels.

For the more medical explanation of LADA click here. Symptoms are very similar to those of type 1 diabetes.

TYPE 2 DIABETES

Type 2 diabetes is classified when the insulin “keys” struggle to do what they need to do. To me, it almost seems like the insulin has dementia - sometimes it's sharp and works well and other times it just can't figure out what to do.

The symptoms of type 2 diabetes, found here, are the same as type 1 diabetes, however, they can be very slow to present, so you can have type 2 diabetes for a number of years before it is picked up.

Approximately 90 to 95% of people with diabetes have Type 2. The treatment options for type 2 diabetes include managing physical activity and learning about what foods have the most impact on glucose levels. It may also require oral medications and/or insulin as the condition progresses.

There is no known cause for type 2 diabetes but there are conditions that put a person at a higher risk for developing type 2 diabetes and are known as risk factors.

Risk Factors for Type 2 Diabetes (from IDF):

There are 10, that's TEN risk factors for type 2 diabetes. Not just the two/three that we ALWAYS hear about.

Family history of diabetes
Increasing age
High blood pressure
Ethnicity
Impaired glucose tolerance (IGT)*
Overweight
Unhealthy diet
Physical inactivity
History of gestational diabetes
Poor nutrition during pregnancy

* Impaired glucose tolerance (IGT) is a category of higher than normal blood glucose, but below the threshold for diagnosing diabetes.

For the more medical explanation of type 2 diabetes click here.

GESTATIONAL DIABETES

Gestational diabetes is a form of diabetes that develops in a woman during pregnancy. It typically disappears once the baby is delivered but it does put the woman at a higher risk of developing type 2 later.

The treatment is similar to type 2 diabetes, in that the focus is usually on nutrition and activity but it may need medical treatment also.

Approximately half of women with a history of GDM go on to develop type 2 diabetes within five to ten years after delivery.

Monogenic TYPES of Diabetes

There are other, much rarer forms of diabetes that are monogenic, meaning a change in only one gene is responsible for the condition. There are two types of conditions in this category: Maturity Onset Diabetes of the Young (MODY) and Neonatal Diabetes Mellitus (NDM).

For these types of diabetes I have to call on the words of experts because I'm not very familiar with them and don't feel comfortable giving a description of something I don't know much about.

MODY - MATURITY ONSET DIABETES OF THE YOUNG

MODY happens when there is a mutation of a gene and is most often hereditary. It very often is confused as other types of diabetes.

"MODY is diagnosed by genetic testing. It may be worth testing for MODY when a person with diabetes doesn’t fit the profile of the more usual types. For example, somebody who actually has MODY may not require as much insulin as most people with Type 1 (and will have measurable C-peptide), even long after the honeymoon period, but they will generally not be of the age and weight you might expect to see for Type 2. In fact, at diagnosis, people with MODY are often young, slim and active." by @SparklyRedShoes

“MODY is very rare compared with Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes – experts estimate that only 1–2% of people with diabetes (20-40,000 people) in the UK have it. But because MODY is so rare, doctors may not be aware of it, so it’s estimated that about 90% of people with it are mistakenly diagnosed with Type 1 or Type 2 diabetes at first.” From Diabetes UK

The key features of MODY are;

Being diagnosed with diabetes under the age of 25.
Having a parent with diabetes, with diabetes in two or more generations.
Not necessarily needing insulin.

It’s important to know if you’ve got MODY, for the following reasons:

To make sure you get the right treatment and advice for your type of diabetes (eg stopping insulin).

As there is a 50% chance of a parent passing on MODY to their child, you can consider and discuss the risk to any children you have/plan to have.
Genetic testing can be offered to other family members.

For the more medical explanation of MODY click here.

NEONATAL DIABETES

From Diabetes UK; “Neonatal diabetes is a form of diabetes that is diagnosed under the age of nine months. Like MODY it's a genetic mutation.”

There are two types of neonatal diabetes – transient and permanent.

Transient neonatal diabetes doesn’t last forever and usually resolves before the age of 12 months. But it usually recurs later on in life, generally during the teenage years.
Permanent neonatal diabetes as you might expect, lasts forever.

It’s a different type of diabetes than the more common Type 1 diabetes as it’s not an autoimmune condition (where the body has destroyed its insulin producing cells).

Around 50 % of people with neonatal diabetes don’t need insulin and can be treated with a tablet called Glibenclamide instead.

More information about neonatal diabetes can be found here.

I’ve only listed 6 of the different types of diabetes here but you can find out more about the additional types here on Diabetes UK's website.