Diabetes is a disease in which the body doesn't produce or properly use insulin. Insulin is a hormone produced in the pancreas, an organ near the stomach. Insulin is needed to turn sugar and other food into energy. When you have diabetes, your body either doesn’t make enough insulin or can’t use its own insulin as well as it should, or both. This causes sugars to build up too high in your blood.
Diabetes mellitus is defined as a fasting blood glucose of 126 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL) or more. “Pre-diabetes” is a condition in which blood glucose levels are higher than normal but not yet diabetic. People with pre-diabetes are at increased risk for developing type 2 diabetes, heart disease and stroke, and have one of these conditions:
- impaired fasting glucose (100 to 125 mg/dL)
- impaired glucose tolerance (fasting glucose less than 126 mg/dL and a glucose level between 140 and 199 mg/dL two hours after taking an oral glucose tolerance test)
