The diagnosis of diabetes mellitus
There
are several symptoms that you may experience if you have diabetes mellitus.
You may feel very thirsty and pass lots of urine. You may also find that you
are losing weight and that you feel tired all the time. Sometimes, patients
complain of blurred vision. Others notice itching around the genitals, suffer
from frequent skin infections or notice that that wounds take a long time to
heal.
If you have any of these symptoms, particularly if you are overweight, have high blood pressure or close family members with diabetes mellitus, you should see your doctor to ask him/her to test you for diabetes mellitus.
Diabetes is diagnosed via a blood test and not a urine test. If you have the above symptoms, it may be possible to make the diagnosis on 1 blood test. However, if the blood sugar is not very high, you may require 2 separate blood tests on different days. Sometimes an oral glucose tolerance test is required. For this test, you will be required to see your doctor in the morning after fasting for at least 8 hours. This means that you should not eat or drink anything except water the night before the test. You should have been eating a normal diet for 3 days prior to the blood test and not exercise heavily the day before the test. Your doctor will give you a very sweet drink containing glucose and will take blood from you after 1 and 2 hours to decide if you have diabetes mellitus.