Blood Sugar

Jack McLaughlin is a bright, articulate Lionville Middle School sixth grader whose main mission these days, along with schoolwork, is keeping his blood sugar under control. Since his diabetes was diagnosed last year when he was 10, the Chester County boy has mastered the tedious process of managing the chronic illness, using a beeper-size, computerized pump that injects insulin into his bloodstream. Counting grams of carbohydrates in order to program the pump with the correct dosage has become as much a part of his daily life as getting dressed and brushing his teeth.

Adult-onset diabetes has risen to an epidemic 14.4 million cases in this country, and while scientists know this rise parallels the expanding waistlines of Americans, they could not figure out how carrying extra fat triggered the disease. Now, scientists at the University of Pennsylvania say they have discovered a hormone, resistin, which is released by fat cells and appears to bring on adult-onset, or type II, diabetes, which can lead to kidney failure, heart failure, nerve damage, blindness, and amputation of limbs.

Like many teenagers, Brendan Hager doesn't have to be dragged out of bed to go to school. He sets his own routine when the morning bell tolls. "Wake up in the morning, see how my blood sugar is and then give myself the first shot," Hager said. It is the first of what commonly are four injections of insulin for Hager, a junior at Conestoga and a Type 1 diabetic who learned long ago to cope with his disease, and succeed despite it. Hager is the starting point guard for the Pioneers boys' basketball team, which opens play in the PIAA Class AAAA state tournament tomorrow against District 3's Red Lion at Carlisle High School.

What used to be called "adult-onset diabetes" — a leading cause of kidney failure, limb amputations, blindness, heart disease, and stroke among adults — is now a growing problem for American children, too. This health challenge, and how to deal with it, will be one of the hottest topics at this weekend's American Diabetes Association conference. An expected 16,000 health professionals, researchers, advocates, and vendors from around the world are gathering at the Convention Center to share the latest in diabetes research.

IREAD WITH dismay your recent story ( "Split at the Top in D.A. Office?" ) and my tenure there as first assistant district attorney. The story, relying exclusively on anonymous sources, presented a terribly inaccurate picture of the office, was unfair to the overwhelming majority of prosecutors who work there and was even more unfair to the district attorney. There was none of the "simmering tension" described in the article, nor did anything "come to a boil. " Instead, after a year-and-a- half during which the only person who put in longer hours than I did was the district attorney, I needed to deal with some personal matters, and to consider my role as an administrator versus my satisfaction in a courtroom setting.

DID YOU hear the footsteps last week? Are they coming for you next? The gargantuan CVS drugstore chain has ordered its nearly 200,000 employees to disclose personal health information - weight, height, body fat, blood pressure, cholesterol, blood sugar - or they will have a $600 penalty added to their annual health-insurance bill. CVS public-relations director Michael DeAngelis sees it differently, telling me that employees who take the survey will pay $600 less for health coverage.

The emergency call came in, and Dave Milsted and Bruce Wallace climbed into the ambulance and raced through traffic to a Cherry Hill apartment building. They arrived to find an elderly woman with a history of diabetes struggling to breathe. Milsted, 47, a paramedic who has been in the business since he was 16, should have started checking her blood sugar. But doing so would have violated state rules that prohibit anyone considered a first-responder from doing anything beyond what is defined as basic life support, regardless of certification.

TAXING TIME Can the income-tax-filing process be made less painful? Yes, say the authors of the Hope Health Letter. If you're feeling frustrated, they advise, remind yourself that you survived the process last year. Divide the job into smaller tasks. Prepare a pleasant place to work, and reward yourself with a movie or dinner out when you finish a big section. Share the job with your family, or consider hiring a professional tax preparer to do part of it. Finally, just do it and get it over with . . . until next year.

WHILE IT MAY seem obvious, too many Americans still resist accepting the simple truth that daily exercise would likely do more to improve their health than a cadre of specialists or the latest pharmacological miracle drug. That's right, and this activity can be something as simple as a 30-minute walk. And I don't mean power walking with weights in your hands - just walking at a rate that you can still talk comfortably. Besides, you already know exercise can make you look younger and more fit, and improve your mood, too. So what's stopping you?

For La'Shaira Cooke, summer is not about lazy afternoons, punctuated by play and Popsicles. Day camp and sports are not allowed. La'Shaira, 9, would like nothing better than to run wild and free in the August heat, anticipating a sweet custard cone to cool off at dusk. But because she suffers from "brittle" diabetes, such simple childhood pleasures are out of bounds. Sweet foods and too much activity can upset the delicate balance of insulin and sugar in her bloodstream, resulting in diabetic shock or other complications that land her in the hospital - or cost her her life.