The cause of Type I diabetes is genetically based, coupled with an abnormal immune response.
The cause of Type II diabetes is unknown. Medical experts believe that Type II diabetes has a genetic component, but that other factors also put people at risk for the disease. These factors include:
- sedentary lifestyle
- obesity (weighing 20 percent above a healthy body weight)
- advanced age
- unhealthy diet
- family history of diabetes
- improper functioning of the pancreas
- minority race (higher risk in Black, Hispanic, American Indian, westernized Asian and native Hawaiian populations)
- medication (cortisone and some high blood pressure drugs)
- Women having given birth to a baby weighing more than 9 lbs.
- previously diagnosed gestational diabetes
- previously diagnosed IGT
