Q: My mother is a diabetic patient. She is 45 yrs old and she has this for the past 15 yrs. She is on diet control only but her blood sugar report is high. She was taking insulin injection both in morning (15 units) and night (5 units), for a month and when blood sugar was checked it was 398 (this is after having breakfast). So now her doctor has suggested increasing the insulin dose. Now she is taking 20 units in the morning and 10 units at night. And day by day she is getting weaker and losing her weight. Please give some suggestion to improve my mother's health.

A:In view of the high sugar level it is likely that the weight loss is due to poor diabetes control. This can be confirmed by doing a test known as the hemoglobin A1c (Glycosylated haemoglobin), which tells about average diabetes control over the last couple of months. It may be useful to rule out common causes of poor diabetes control such as chest or urine infection, stress, or thyroid disease. Your mothers insulin dose should be increased as needed to control the blood glucose. There is no fixed dose for a person - it has to adjusted according to the requirement. Frequent blood glucose monitoring is very important.