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“Diabetes is one of the most common chronic diseases in children after asthma, but the percentage of kids who have it is still relatively low,” says Parents advisor Lori Laffel, MD, chief of the pediatric, adolescent, and young-adult section at Harvard’s Joslin Diabetes Center. Many parents have misconceptions about the illness. This often keeps them from understanding the best ways to help kids avoid or manage diabetes.

Many parents believe that children who get diabetes are the ones with a weight problem. This is not always the case. In type 1 diabetes the immune system mistakenly destroys healthy cells in the pancreas that produce insulin, the hormone that helps the body get energy from food, and at this time there is no known cause. In type 2 diabetes, the pancreas usually makes plenty of insulin, but cells throughout the body have trouble using it. This creates a condition known as insulin resistance.

Parents need to help their children keep blood sugar at normal  levels. This is the key to a healthy life for your child. Poorly controlled blood sugar levels can lead to a variety of problems, including heart attack, cirrhosis of the liver, blindness, and kidney failure. Fortunately, it takes about five to ten years of poorly controlled blood sugar to cause any of these serious conditions.

So, now is your chance to teach your children how to control blood sugar levels. There are very simple ways to accomplish this. Teach them to eat better, lose weight if needed, and exercise regularly. All these things will help insulin to work more effectively. Of course, if these lifestyle changes are no enough see a pediatrician.