June 26, 2006
Diagnosis and Symptoms, Other
Question from Lyman, South Carolina, USA:
Our six year old daughter was diagnosed on May 20,2006 with type 1. We took her to the Emergency Room (ER) with ketoacidosis and a blood sugar over 600 mg/dl [33.3 mmol/L] on the hospital meter. She has been taking shots daily and doing well with her diet. I have recently asked if they were going to do a test to see what was actually still functioning in relation to insulin and her pancreas and I was told that the test was expensive and they to not perform when children present the way she did. I just read a question from your site that explained how, sometimes, atypical diabetes mellitus is diagnosed as type 1 and they should be retested after insulin treatment. Should I push the issue with her doctor to have the test done? Is there a current study that she can participate in that deals with this?
Answer:
If you are not happy with the previous discussions with your diabetes team, then you should, of course, bring up the questions again. From your description, this sounds like typical child onset type 1 diabetes. Often, islet cell or GAD-65 antibodies can easily be done to see if they are positive and this would help distinguish usual from unusual types of diabetes. A lot of times, this can also be done by the clinical course, how your child’s insulin needs and blood glucose levels change over time. Measuring insulin or C-Peptide levels is generally not necessary unless part of a formal research study.
SB
