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Definition, epidemiology, diagnosis and classification
Definition
Diabetes mellitus is a metabolic disorder of multiple etiology, characterized by chronic hyperglycemia due to defective insulin secretion or insulin action or both
- The ancient words diabetes mellitus described the ‘flowing over of sweet urine’ associated with the characteristic symptoms of polyuria (accompanied by polydipsia) and the confirmatory diagnostic feature of glycosuria
- In childhood and adolescence, diabetes is most often associated with a genetically determined predisposition, the presence of autoimmune markers, aggressive beta-cell destruction, severe insulin deficiency, and the urgent need for insulin replacement therapy because of the risk of ketoacidosis
- Historically various terms have been used to describe this type of diabetes
- juvenile diabetes
- ketosis-prone diabetes
- autoimmune diabetes
- insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM) and, with recent international agreement (WHO, 1998)
- type 1 diabetes
- Characteristic features of type 1 diabetes in comparison with type 2 diabetes are shown in Table 1
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