People With Diabetes Can Live Longer by Meeting Their Treatment Goals. Life expectancy can be increased by 3 years or in some cases as much as 10 years. At age 50, life expectancy- the number of years a person is expected to live- is 6 years shorter for people with type 2 diabetes than for people without it.
The metabolic disease can lead to heart disease, stroke, blindness, and other medical problems, and is often severe enough to shave years off the lifespan. But trim, white-haired Bob Krause, who turned 90 last week, is still going strong. The San Diego resident is believed to be the oldest diabetic ever.
Indeed, myocardial infarction is the leading cause of death among individuals with diabetes mellitus.
Many people have type 2 diabetes for years without realising because the early symptoms tend to be general, or there are no symptoms at all.
Some people have even lived with diabetes for seven and eight decades! It's important to know the risks of having a lifelong illness, but to not lose hope.
The risk of death with diabetes rises very significantly with age. In a 20 year old, it is about 1 in 200,000. In a 60 year old it is about 1 in 10,000. In an 80 year old it is 1 in 1000.
Over half a million people die every year (1), of these around 75,000 will have diabetes (11). Most will not die as a result of acute diabetes complications but of other comorbidities associated with the condition such as, cancer, stroke, respiratory disease, or cardiovascular disease (12).
Diabetes is the No. 1 cause of kidney failure, lower-limb amputations, and adult blindness.
Diabetes Life Expectancy
The average life expectancy of a type 2 diabetic patient is between 77 to 81 years. However, it is not uncommon for diabetics to live past the age of 85, should they be able to maintain good blood sugar levels and lengthen their lifespan.
CLEVELAND, Ohio (Ivanhoe Newswire) – There are more than a million people who have type one diabetes, and they can expect to live at least 10 years less than Americans without the disease. In fact, there are only 90 diabetics who have lived more than 70 years.
The only known cure for Type 1 diabetes is either a pancreas transplant or a transplant of the specialized pancreatic cells that produce insulin. But with a shortage of available organs and 1.6 million people in the U.S. living with the disease, a cure for the vast majority is not possible.
Life expectancy estimates for individuals with type 1 diabetes in these reports ranged from approximately 65 years of age to 72 years of age. The CDC currently estimates the average US life expectancy is 76.1 years, the lowest figure since 1996.
Managing diabetes can be hard. Sometimes you may feel overwhelmed. Having diabetes means that you need to check your blood sugar levels often, make healthy food choices, be physically active, remember to take your medicine, and make other good decisions about your health several times a day.
The average age of onset for type 2 diabetes. The onset of type 2 diabetes is most common in people aged 45–64. It usually appears after the age of 45 but can occur at any age. Type 2 diabetes accounts for 90–95% of the adult diagnoses of diabetes in the United States.
Diabetes occurs in four stages: Insulin resistance, prediabetes, type 2 diabetes, and type 2 diabetes with vascular complications. You are at higher risk for these conditions if you are older than 45, have close biological relatives with diabetes, are physically inactive, or have extra weight.
Left untreated, diabetes can lead to heart disease, stroke, nerve and kidney damage, vision loss and more. Even if you have mild blood sugar elevations, you can damage your organs. Diabetes is a common condition.
The symptoms of diabetes include feeling very thirsty, passing more urine than usual, and feeling tired all the time. The symptoms occur because some or all of the glucose stays in your blood and isn't used as fuel for energy. Your body tries to get rid of the excess glucose in your urine.
Overweight, obesity, and physical inactivity
You are more likely to develop type 2 diabetes if you are not physically active and are overweight or have obesity. Extra weight sometimes causes insulin resistance and is common in people with type 2 diabetes.
This figure represents nearly 3% of all mortality in that year and a death rate of 23.2 per 100,000 individuals in the general population of the United States (30).
If you have a mother, father, sister, or brother with diabetes, you are more likely to get diabetes yourself. You are also more likely to have prediabetes. Talk to your doctor about your family health history of diabetes.
Even if your diabetes has been well controlled for years, the condition can still worsen over time, meaning, you may have to adjust your treatment plan more than once.
No cure for diabetes currently exists, but the disease can go into remission. When diabetes goes into remission, it means that the body does not show any signs of diabetes, although the disease is technically still present.
Diabetes is a serious disease that can affect your eyes, heart, nerves, feet and kidneys.