Diabetes and Driving: Low Sugar is Dangerous
In recent years, there has been a lot of attention paid to obesity and its complications, which include diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart disease. When someone has been diagnosed with diabetes, this often leads to a significant shift in their lifestyle. Unfortunately, over the past few decades, diabetes has become more common than ever before. Some of the statistics that have been published by the American Diabetes Association on diabetes include:
- In 2015, about 10 percent of the population in the United States had been diagnosed with diabetes, approximately 30 million people.
- About a quarter of all people in the United States over 65 have diabetes.
- Around 1.5 million people in the United States are diagnosed with diabetes yearly.
Diabetes is a severe diagnosis and needs to be treated as such. If diabetes is uncontrolled, blood sugar levels can vary from too high to too low. Furthermore, this can also lead to severe complications.
What is Diabetes?
Diabetes is one of the most common causes of death in the United States and results from the inability of the body to control its blood sugar levels. There are two types of diabetes, which are:
- Type 1 Diabetes: This results from the autoimmune destruction of the cells in the pancreas that produce insulin.
- Type 2 Diabetes: In this type of diabetes, the body does not respond adequately to insulin.
Insulin helps reduce the body’s blood sugar levels after a meal. If the body does not make its own insulin, or if it cannot respond to insulin, blood sugar levels could remain high.
How Can Low Blood Sugar Cause an Auto Accident?
Because people with diabetes often have high blood sugar levels, they take medications to help bring these levels within reasonable limits. These medications can have serious side effects. One of the side effects is actually blood sugar that drops too low. Some of the symptoms of low blood sugar, called hypoglycemia, include:
- Feeling light-headed or faint
- Headaches and trouble concentrating
- Confusion
- Fainting
- Seizures
These are severe symptoms and could easily lead to an auto accident if they occur while driving. Therefore, people with diabetes need to keep a source of sugar in the car with them. This could include juice, soda, or even a candy bar. This can help restore blood glucose levels to normal limits before someone passes out or has a seizure. A car accident could lead to severe traumatic injuries.
Watch the YouTube Video: Driving with Diabetes. This short video explains how the side effects of diabetes can complicate driving.
Help from a Personal Injury Law Firm
When someone has been diagnosed with diabetes, it is essential to ensure that blood glucose levels stay within normal limits. This can prevent some of the severe complications of diabetes from developing. Some of the common issues that could arise with diabetes include:
- Medication use while driving.
- Problems with health insurance coverage of medications.
- Serious injuries that could result from a car accident.
- Questions about how an accident happened in the first place.
- Wondering where someone can turn for help.
If someone is involved in a car accident, particularly one that leads to severe injuries, it is vital to ask for help. Meeting with a trained car accident lawyer in Sacramento can help a family answer essential questions.
California Car Accident Lawyers
I’m Ed Smith, a car accident injury lawyer in Sacramento. When someone has been diagnosed with diabetes, it is important to keep tight control of blood glucose levels. If those suffering from diabetes get behind the wheel, it could lead to a car accident. If you or a loved one has suffered injuries in a car accident, call me at (916) 921-6400 or (800) 404-5400 for free, friendly legal advice.
I am a member of the Million Dollar Advocates Forum.
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Image Attribution: The photo at the start of this article is seen in its original form on Pixabay. The image has been reproduced here with permission/Diabetes and Driving: Low Sugar is Dangerous.
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