Do diabetes and polyneuropathy have common causes?

Chinese medicine successfully treats both diseases

In Germany alone there are about 8 million diabetics. Literally, diabetes mellitus means "sweet passage" and describes that the blood sugar level is elevated. Treatment is usually with sugar tablets or insulin. However, an elevated blood sugar level can often be found if the diabetes has not yet been diagnosed or is poorly adjusted. This can lead to long-term damage to nerves, small blood vessels and kidneys. For example, diabetes is considered to be the most common and well-known cause of polyneuropathy, a nervous condition that usually manifests itself first on the feet and legs. About half of the type 2 diabetics eventually get sick.

Against this background, the following figures can also be explained: up to 11 percent already have a sensitive polyneuropathy when diagnosed with diabetes. In prediabetics, so-called "still-healthy", in which the blood sugar increases only with extreme sugar intake, the disease rate is even up to 20 percent. This in turn means that polyneuropathy is already there before diabetes manifests, especially when the abdominal girth and body weight are significantly increased. An explanatory model for this provides Chinese medicine with the so-called Tan concept.

People with diabetes are at an increased risk for cardiovascular disease. The main cause of this is arteriosclerosis. Researchers are working to reduce atherosclerotic heart disease in diabetics. (Image: Printemps / fotolia.com)

Dr. Christian Schmincke, expert in Chinese medicine and director of the Steigerwald Clinic, explains what this means: "As 'Tan', Chinese medicine is representative of all unwanted substances that escape the body's excretory and excretory activities." frequently elevated blood sugar can have long-term material consequences that correspond to the Tan concept. An increased blood sugar would therefore lead to an attachment of sugar molecules to the body's own proteins. The latter in turn lose their biological function and accumulate as unwanted waste products - the tan - in the tissues.

"Tan impedes the exchange of substances between blood and nerves, because it accumulates and deposits - the nerve endings suffocate, so to speak, for lack of vital nutrients," emphasizes polyneuropathy expert dr. Schmincke. Another theory is that tan hinders all transport between the bloodstream and organs. This would in principle also hinder insulin as a blood sugar regulator in its effect. Diabetes and polyneuropathy would thus have the same origin in an excessive Tan accumulation. "The similarities in the causes of diabetes and polyneuropathy are supported by experience: both diseases can be successfully treated with similar drug formulations."

The central treatment of Far Eastern medicine is the Chinese drug therapy. It succeeds in dissolving the inflammatory lumps in the tissue, transferring them into the circulation and excreting them via the mucous membranes. "In the phase of improving individual symptoms of polyneuropathy, we often observe marked changes in excretions and other vegetative signs that indicate relieving," Dr. Schmincke the therapy process. This healing process can be supported by acupuncture and physiotherapeutic procedures. The Chinese therapeutic success for polyneuropathy, which is generally considered to be "incurable", is good: about every second patient with severe forms of disease can be helped in the medium and long term. Also in diabetes, the therapy suggests well.