Diabetes is a chronic condition that affects how your body turns food into energy. There are three main types of diabetes:
- Type 1 diabetes – Your body does not produce insulin. It is an autoimmune disease. You need to take insulin to survive.
- Type 2 diabetes – Your body does not produce enough insulin or use it well. It accounts for 90-95% of diabetes cases.
- Gestational diabetes – Higher than normal blood sugar during pregnancy. It usually resolves after pregnancy.
If diabetes remains untreated, it can lead to dangerous, even life-threatening complications. However, the life expectancy depends on several factors.
How Does Untreated Diabetes Affect Your Health?
Over time, uncontrolled high blood sugar from diabetes can damage your blood vessels and nerves. This can lead to various complications:
- Cardiovascular disease: 2-4x higher risk of heart attack, stroke, and diseases of the small blood vessels.
- Nerve damage (neuropathy): Pain, numbness, or loss of feeling in the hands and feet. Impaired digestion, sexual function, etc.
- Kidney disease (nephropathy): Diabetic kidney disease is the leading cause of kidney failure.
- Eye damage (retinopathy): Blurred vision, blindness, and other eye problems.
- Foot damage: Poor circulation and nerve damage increasing risk of foot ulcers, infection, and ultimately amputation.
- Skin conditions: Bacterial and fungal infections.
These issues can significantly reduce quality of life. But how quickly they develop and severity depends on how high and how long blood sugars have been elevated.
Life Expectancy with Untreated Type 1 Diabetes
Before the discovery of insulin in 1921, type 1 diabetes was a fatal disease. Most patients died within 1-2 years of diagnosis due to dangerously high blood sugar levels.
Today, with insulin therapy and care, most people with type 1 diabetes live long, healthy lives. However, without insulin injections, patients typically survive only weeks to months:
- Death often occurs from diabetic ketoacidosis, a buildup of blood acids without insulin.
- Survival beyond 1 year is very rare without treatment.
- Estimates suggest life expectancy is reduced by 15 years on average compared to the general population.
Therefore, insulin is absolutely vital for type 1 diabetes. Without treatment, rapid deterioration and death is almost certain.
Life Expectancy with Untreated Type 2 Diabetes
Type 2 diabetes progresses more slowly than type 1. Many people live for months or even years before symptoms appear. However, without treatment, complications and reduced life span often follow:
- Develops complications on average after 10 years.
- Life expectancy reduced by 5-10 years on average.
- Untreated, only about half live more than 10 years after diagnosis.
- Cardiovascular disease is the main cause of death.
Treatment with lifestyle changes, metformin, and other medications can significantly delay onset of complications. So early detection and management is key.
How Does Management of Type 2 Diabetes Affect Life Expectancy?
Studies show that good control of blood sugar, blood pressure, cholesterol can extend the life expectancy of people with type 2 diabetes to near that of people without diabetes.
Here is data on how duration of diabetes and management affects life expectancy:
| Duration of Diabetes | Life Expectancy with Good Management | Life Expectancy with Poor Management |
|---|---|---|
| Less than 10 years | Near normal | 5-10 years less |
| More than 10 years | 5 years less | 10 years less |
So the earlier diabetes is diagnosed and treatment begins, the better the likely outcomes. Managing blood sugar, blood pressure, cholesterol, lifestyle factors extends life span.
Factors Affecting How Long You Can Live with Untreated Diabetes
Several key factors affect how long someone may survive with untreated diabetes and the development of complications:
- Type of diabetes – Type 1 diabetes is more rapidly fatal without insulin.
- Age at diagnosis – The younger you are, the greater the impact on life expectancy.
- Duration of uncontrolled diabetes – The longer high blood sugars go unchecked, the more damage.
- Blood sugar levels – The higher and more uncontrolled, the worse the complications.
- Other health conditions – High blood pressure, cholesterol, obesity add to risks.
- Lifestyle factors – Smoking, lack of exercise.
- Access to medical care – Early treatment improves outcomes.
Can Diabetes Be Reversed?
For type 1 diabetes, insulin dependence is lifelong. The damage to insulin-producing cells is permanent.
However, some research suggests type 2 diabetes can be reversed in some circumstances, especially with early intervention. Weight loss, healthy diet, and exercise leading to normal blood sugars for long enough may allow beta cell recovery.
Bariatric surgery has shown promise in reversing diabetes. Very low calorie diets, medication, and lifestyle interventions have shown initial reversal as well. But for many, the condition eventually progresses again.
What Are Warning Signs of Untreated Diabetes?
Look out for the following symptoms that may indicate untreated or poorly controlled diabetes:
- Frequent urination, increased thirst, increased hunger
- Unexplained weight loss
- Fatigue, drowsiness
- Blurred vision
- Slow healing of cuts and bruises
- Tingling, pain, numbness in hands or feet
- Recurring skin, gum, bladder infections
Monitor your blood sugar with a home test kit if you have any of these symptoms. Catching it early makes a big difference in outcomes.
Can You Have Diabetes with Normal Blood Sugar?
It’s possible, but uncommon. Some types of diabetes and prediabetes don’t always show up on standard blood glucose tests:
- Type 1 diabetes – Autoimmune destruction of insulin cells may already be quite advanced before hyperglycemia develops.
- Latent autoimmune diabetes in adults (LADA) – Slow progressing type 1 in adults, blood sugars can initially be normal.
- MODY – This monogenic diabetes doesn’t always present with high blood sugar early on.
Also, some people with insulin resistance and hyperinsulinemia can maintain normal blood sugars for a long time before developing prediabetes or type 2 diabetes.
So normal blood sugar doesn’t definitively rule out diabetes risk. Discuss screening with your doctor.
Take Home Message
Left untreated, both type 1 and type 2 diabetes significantly reduce life expectancy. For type 1 diabetes, insulin is essential for survival beyond a few weeks or months.
With type 2 diabetes, good control of blood sugar, blood pressure, cholesterol levels, and lifestyle factors can extend life expectancy close to that of people without diabetes. Especially if treated early at diagnosis.
So if you have symptoms or risk factors for diabetes, get your blood sugar tested promptly. Catching and treating diabetes early is important for living a long and healthy life.