Hello people.

I see diabetes listed as a risk factor for heart diseases and I wonder how bad it really is to have diabetes. Is it as bad as smoking? I suppose it depends on how well diabetes is controlled but I just want to get an idea of what damage high blood sugar does to you body.

Cheers.

Uncontrolled diabetes is actually WORSE than smoking cigarettes (from a cardiovascular standpoint). Having uncontrolled blood sugar is like having something the consisteny of maple syrup in your veins and arteries… this in turn causes the heart to work much harder, and it also damages the microvasculature in the body (like in the kidneys and eyes). The vascular system is in a constant state of inflammation… tiny breaks in the blood vessels occur. When this happens, the body tries to repair it by clotting, and heart attacks are usually caused when one of these clots break off and get lodged in the vasculature of the heart causing oxygen deprivation. So yeah, it’s bad.
However, if a diabetic controls their blood sugar well, they have about the same risk for heart disease that any of us do.

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