Maturity Onset Diabetes of The Young - Management

Management

Unfortunately, chronic hyperglycemia of any cause can eventually cause blood vessel damage and the microvascular complications of diabetes. The principal treatment goals for people with MODY — keeping the blood sugars as close to normal as possible ("good glycemic control"), while minimizing other vascular risk factors — are the same for all known forms of diabetes.

Tools for management are those for all forms of diabetes: blood testing, changes in diet, physical exercise, oral hypoglycemic agents, and insulin injections. In many cases these goals can be achieved more easily with MODY than with ordinary types 1 and 2 diabetes. Some people with MODY may require insulin injections to achieve the same glycemic control that another person may attain with careful eating or an oral medication.

When oral hypoglycemic agents are used in MODY, the sulfonylureas remain the oral medication of first resort. When compared to patients with type 2 diabetes, MODY patients are often more sensitive to sulphonylureas, such that a lower dose should be used to initiate treatment to avoid hypoglycaemia. Patients with MODY less often suffer from obesity and insulin resistance than those with ordinary type 2 diabetes (for whom insulin sensitizers like metformin or the thiazolidinediones are often preferred over the sulfonylureas).