Diabetes and My foot!!

Over A period, persistently high blood sugar levels can damage the nerves and blood vessels. This can affect our hands and feet too. This nerve damage it’s called diabetic neuropathy. If you start to feel tingling, any kind of numbness, abnormal sensations, or no sensation at all in your foot, it’s time to be alarmed! But more than 90% cases diabetic neuropathy does not produce any symptom and you never know that it is happening! If we can’t feel pain in our feet, then we wouldn’t get to know if there is a cut, trauma, or a blister. Which can be responsible for a catastrophic health situation.

Diabetic foot can be of purely ischemic which is very painful but rare, neuropathic or neuroischemic; both are asymptomatic. So, what does a diabetic foot pain feel like? It’s a sharp shooting pain along with numbness, as compared to dull aches associated with other foot problems. So, the concerns are neuropathic or neuroischemic one. But how they can be detected? Your physician can confirm diabetic neuropathy by few simple screening tests like monofilament touch test and vibration perception test. One it is detected complications of diabetic foot can be avoided with adequate preventive care.

In an established neuropathic foot following symptoms are alarming, like persistent pain in the legs, wounds which wouldn’t heal, ingrown toenails which might catch fungus, any change in colour or temperature of the skin. If attended on time, most of these problems can be taken care of. Keeping good foot Hygiene and regularly checking the feet for any signs of infection are the keys to the Prevention of complications of diabetic foot.

 Disclaimer: Dr. Swati Singla is not a diabetic expert. Information in this blog is the expression of her own understanding following reading different diabetic related recommendations, newsletters, and scientific evidence.