Medical Encyclopedia

With diabetes your susceptibility to a wide range of diseases threatening your whole-body function and well-being increases greatly. The eyes are particularly liable to damage inflicted on small blood vessels of the retina, i.e. the condition known as retinopathy.

Diabetic retinopathy is a grave long-term complication of diabetes that impairs vision and can eventually lead to complete blindness. On entering the cells with the bloodstream excess glucose leads to the formation of advanced glycation end products which over time accumulate in the eyes. That is why protecting the retina becomes one of the high priorities in treatment for diabetes and it requires keeping blood glucose levels low. A regular glycemic control is an indispensable thing for a diabetic in any case, but you still should be ready for the difficulties to arise because it is impossible to prevent hyperglycemia altogether, which sooner or later tells negatively on the retina destroying the delicate retina's blood vessels as well as damaging the optic nerve, the lens and the muscles of the eye. Profile researches have elicited an enzyme, called transkeolase, that blocks the absorption of too much glucose into cells. This is where benfotiamine comes into play. There is an additional way of utilizing advanced glycation end products inherent in our body. This is the pentose-phosphate pathway which is brought to function by transkeolase. Benfotiamine has proved to increase the activity of transkeolase thus preventing cell damage of the retina resulting from exposure to hyperglycemia.

The experiments have been carried out on animals which clearly show that benfortiamine could prevent diabetic retinopathy. It has already received its extensive use as a strong therapeutical medication in Europe and is beginning to be used on a really large scale in the United States.

The established truth is that the more you know as to how to handle your disease the slower your complications progress and the longer you can live your life productively. Exactly for this reason benfotiamine, a strong deterrent against diabetic retinopathy, has been worked out: for a diabetic to be able to inhibit the build-up of glucose and glycation end products. Benfotiamine will not cure you of diabetes. It is aimed at slowing the onset of its complications. The most important things is that it does show positive results in helping control the level of blood sugar therefore allowing you to enjoy the visual pleasures of this world to advantage as long as it is only possible.