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ShareInsulin and Type 2 Diabetes: What You Should Know
The decision to start taking insulin isn't easy. How do you know if you need it, and, if you do, what's the best way to start? Before you and your doctor make a decision, learn the latest on insulin.
Insulin and Type 2 Diabetes
If your doctor offered you a medication to help you feel better and to help get your blood sugar under control after oral medicines had failed, would you try it? If so, insulin might be the answer to getting your diabetes treatment back on the right path.
Insulin -- do you immediately think of type 1 diabetes? Think again. Between 30 to 40 percent of people who have type 2 diabetes take insulin, according to research by the Roper Center. Experts believe even more people with type 2 should take insulin to control blood glucose -- the earlier, the better.
"If you live long enough with type 2 diabetes, odds are good you'll eventually need insulin," says William Polonsky, Ph.D., CDE, assistant clinical professor in psychiatry at the University of California, San Diego, and author of Diabetes Burnout: What to Do When You Can't Take it Anymore (American Diabetes Association, 1999).
