If it’s you or a family member struggling with diabetes, start living a healthy lifestyle. Along with taking promising diabetic care products, get well-versed with tips to take care of a diabetic patient in order to mitigate life-threatening risks. To nurse a diabetic patient at home, you’d need to lay emphasis on providing him/her a restricted and healthy diet, all means to keep the patient away from stress, and consistent health check-ups to assess sugar levels. In detail, let’s look at useful ways to care for a diabetic patient at home.
Strictly Stop Consuming Sweets
Eating sweets tend to increase your sugar levels. With diabetes, it is important for your body to keep the sugar levels in check and effectively respond to insulin.
That being said, consumption of too many sweets can burden your pancreas and lead to releasing insulin excessively which in turn would aggravate your existing health condition.
However, if you cannot resist your sweet craving, look for alternatives like an avocado mousse or chia seed pudding to binge on. The fructose and glucose levels in these dishes are minimal.
Therefore, taking diabetic care products and strictly keeping sweets away, is one of the primary tips to take care of a diabetic patient.
Get Rid of Smoking
If you want to take strict care of a diabetic patient at home, let that be yourself too, say ‘goodbye’ to nicotine and stop smoking for good.
Smoking leads to other health issues such as amputations, kidney problems, and heart diseases.
Take Active Measures to Keep Cholesterol Levels in Control
If you want to save a diabetic person from heart stroke or an attack, work on keeping the cholesterol levels in check.
Bad cholesterol levels latch onto the walls of the arteries, and this indicates a high risk. Studies suggest, low levels of HDL cholesterol can increase the risk of type 2 diabetes. To avoid complications, a good diet and minimum workout is necessary.
Therefore, if you want to nurse a diabetic patient, keep a track of every minute detail like their cholesterol and blood sugar levels. It is necessary to maintain a LDL level below 100mg/dL or 70 mg/dL.
Take Care of Your Teeth and Feet
Diabetes has the potential to affect many parts of your body. That being said, it can have a repercussion on your feet and teeth.
As mentioned earlier, diabetic care products alone aren’t enough. To take care of a diabetic patient at home, follow these tips
- Go for regular dental check-ups, diabetes can cause gum infections. Brush your teeth and regularly floss it well to protect your teeth.
- Keep an eye on your feet chances are it might swell up and form blisters. Always wash, dry, and moisturize it.
Remain Active and Accept the Disease on A Positive Note
Being diabetic can upset you but it is still on how you accept and cope with the disease. At any cost, keep stress away. Getting stressed while you are diabetic can increase blood pressure and worsen it for you. Thus, if you or your family member is diabetic and need nursing, it all begins with changing your mindset and thinking positively about coping with diabetes.
To stay positive, you need activities to keep yourself diverted and good. Some of the interesting activities you can resort to are singing, dancing, playing a sport, following your passion, joining an NGO, or working for the environment. Diabetic care products are always there for additional support but at the same time making sure to stay active is one of the most important tips to take care of a diabetic patient at home.
Here are things you can do to stay active with diabetes
- Start walking for 30 minutes regularly.
- Try push-ups, abs and carry lightweights to improve muscle strength.
- Practice yoga three times a week – this increases flexibility and stamina.
Avoid Being an Alcoholic
With a diabetic patient at home and especially if u want to take care of one, it is not advisable to let that person drink too much alcohol. A little of alcohol will make sure that your blood sugar levels are in control. However, excessive consumption may lead to a rise fall in blood sugar levels and this is not healthy. Yet another tip to consider for those drinking alcohol with diabetes is that they should eat small meals while drinking and not take more than a peg each day.
Follow A Healthy Diet
Always take good care of a diabetic patient at home where what they should eat and avoid eating is concerned. To an extent diabetic care products can work away, but not always, eating good food is the key to keeping diabetes in control.
A diabetic patient should never skip meals or have an empty stomach. They should always consume small meals because there is a high risk for blood glucose levels to the dropdown.
Focus on cutting down on all sugar cravings and get them used to drink bitter juices and sugar-free drinks.
Foods like yogurt, beef sticks, chickpeas, almonds, veggies etc. are healthy and safe. On the other hand, processed and fried foods are harmful for those with diabetes.
Conclusion
Hope these 7 tips to take care of a diabetes patient at home is insightful and useful to you in time of need. Although diabetes is a serious health condition, taking necessary precautions such as staying away from alcohol, nicotine, caffeine, sugar, getting regular check-ups done, exercising, finding effective ways to manage stress, and following a healthy diet is considered, you can be sure that you or your family member won’t be at a risk. Along with some of these natural ways to manage diabetes, you can even look at what kind of diabetic care products is useful for you or your family member.