Type 2 Diabetes And Carbs
People with type 2 diabetes should eat the very foods that raise blood glucose the most? Illogical is the only word that comes to mind. This happened, not just in the United States, but around the world. The British Diabetes Association, European Association for the Study of Diabetes , Canadian Diabetes Association, American Heart Association, National Cholesterol Education Panel recommend fairly similar diets keeping carbohydrates at 50-60% of total calories and dietary fat at less than thirty percent.
The 2008 American Diabetes Association position statement on nutrition advised that Dietary strategies including reduced calories and reduced intake of dietary fat, can reduce the risk for developing diabetes and are therefore recommended. The logic is hard to follow. Dietary fat does not raise blood glucose. Reducing fat to emphasize carbohydrates, known to raise blood glucose could protect against diabetes?
It further advised that intake of sucrose and sucrose-containing foods by people with diabetes does not need to be restricted. Eating sugar was OK for people with type 2 diabetes? This could not realistically be expected to lower blood glucose, and the proof came soon enough.
The 2012 Treatment Options for Type 2 Diabetes in Adolescents and Youths randomized study reduced caloric intake to 1200-1500 calories per day of a low-fat diet. Despite this massive effort, blood glucose was not improved. This classic Eat Less, Move More strategy failed yet again.
Research Into Diet And Stopping The Symptoms Of Type 2 Diabetes Are Still In Their Infancy But There Are Some Interesting Developments Writes Clair Naughton
Reversing type 2 diabetes is something that is discussed regularly in magazines and on television with stories of people being cured of diabetes. On closer inspection, all these stories have a common thread the people who have reversed their diabetes have done so by losing large amounts of body weight, often the equivalent of 10-15% of their total body weight.
It is generally accepted as true that with massive weight loss, a person can potentially reduce the demands on their body so much that they now acquire sufficient working insulin to control their glucose levels.
Visceral fat and type 2 diabetesWhen fat stores build up in the liver the fat eventually extends over into the pancreas . The build up of fat in the pancreas over time prevents the pancreas releasing insulin after meals, thereby causing high blood glucose levels and type 2 diabetes.
Professor Roy Taylor of Newcastle University in England has been carrying out research in the area of reversing type 2 diabetes for the past few years. He suggests that too much fat in the liver, the pancreas and around the abdomen preventing normal insulin release and normal insulin action are defects that can be reversed by substantial weight loss.
We all individually have a personal fat threshold
The results of the latest of Professor Taylors research study into the reversal of type 2 diabetes were published on 6th November :
Background
More work yet to do
Dont go it alone
Why Is Diet And Exercise The Best Combination
Losing weight and maintaining a healthy weight is a key part of keeping your diabetes in remission. One of the best ways to lose weight is through diet and exercise.
When it comes to diet, experts suggest watching portion sizes and adding plenty of fruits and vegetables, healthy fats, high-quality proteins and high-fibre foods to your meal plan. Find more on how diet can reverse diabetes.
The longer you can stay in a reversed state of diabetes, the better your chances of delaying or preventing further complications of the disease. By combining a good diet with regular exercise, you give your body the best chance to do just that.
Curious about other potential ways to reverse or cure diabetes? Find some more tips here.
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How Exercise And Diet Can Reverse Type 2 Diabetes
Type 2 diabetes is a pervasive health problem in the U.S. As of 2018, more than 10 percent of the American population had this metabolic disease. Thats more than 32 million people with type 2 diabetes, in contrast to 1.6 million who have type 1 diabetes, an autoimmune disorder.
Contrary to popular belief, this disease is not simply a matter of high blood glucose alone. Over time, type 2 diabetes erodes the health of the entire body and can have negative effects on the cardiovascular system, nervous system, circulation, weight, endocrine health, mental health, gut health, and beyond.
Tens of thousands of studies and reviews have been published on type 2 diabetes in recent years. While the medical community traditionally states that it is a life-long condition, new research has made it increasingly clear that this condition may be reversible with the right combination of diet and exercise.
What Does Reversing Diabetes Mean
Does losing weight and improving your sensitivity to insulin reverse your diabetes? Or have you simply taken steps to manage it in a way that for some led to no longer needing diabetes medications to achieve healthy blood sugar levels?
In a great deal of diabetes research, diabetes remission is actually defined as blood sugar levels being at pre-diabetic levels rather than non-diabetic levels.
The fact is that type 2 diabetes is a progressive disease for many versus simply an issue of insulin resistance. The word progressive implies the ongoing dysfunction and destruction of beta-cells which play a critical role in the production of insulin.
For patients with beta-cell dysfunction in addition to insulin resistance, the ability to reverse diabetes and get off of your meds may not always be possible.
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Make Changes That Count
“The term ‘reversal’ is used when people can go off medication but still must engage in a lifestyle program in order to stay off,” says Ann Albright, PhD, RD. She’s the director of diabetes translation at the CDC.
Shedding extra pounds and keeping them off can help you better control your blood sugar.
For some people, reaching a healthier weight will mean taking fewer medications, or in rarer cases, no longer needing those medications at all.
Losing 5% to 10% of your body weight and building up to 150 minutes of exercise a week may help you to slow or stop the progress of type 2 diabetes.
“If you sit most of the day, 5 or 10 minutes is going to be great,” Albright says. “Walk to your mailbox. Do something that gets you moving, knowing that you’re looking to move towards 30 minutes most days of the week.”
What Causes Type 2 Diabetes
There are several factors that contribute to developing type 2 diabetes. Being obese or overweight is one of the biggest risk factors. Although this is a lifelong medical conditon, it is said that genetics and sedentary lifestyle, eating habits, lack of physical activity, etc. also play the contributing factors.
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Heredity Need Not Be Destiny
Many people think theyre destined for lifetime struggles with excess weight and ultimately diabetes because its in my genes. They had parents or grandparents who were overweight and had diabetes.
And sure, genetic factors predispose some of us to become fatter than others, but for most Americans, heredity need not be destiny, argues Dr. Danine Fruge, MD, ABFP, Medical Director and Educator at the Pritikin Longevity Center.
To her patients at Pritikin, Dr. Fruge brings the enthusiasm and expertise of a doctor who practices what she preaches.
So Which One Is The Driving Factor Behind Your Own Type 2 Diabetes
It is now well recognized that 2 factors are involved: impaired function and insulin resistance, explains John E. Gerich, MD, in a study published by the Mayo Clinic Proceedings. Prospective studies of high-risk populations have shown insulin-resistance and/or insulin-secretory defects before the onset of impaired glucose tolerance.
While testing for impaired beta-cell function is not possible for the general population at this time, the end result of insulin deficiency or insulin resistance is the same: high blood sugar levels.
Most of the available evidence favors the view that type 2 diabetes is a heterogeneous disorder in which the major genetic factor is impaired beta-cell function and insulin resistance is the major acquired factor, explains Gerich.
Superimposition of insulin resistance on a beta-cell that cannot appropriately compensate leads to deterioration in glucose tolerance. Therefore, clinicians managing type 2 diabetes must reduce insulin resistance and augment and/or replace beta-cell function.
This means: its critical that doctors also focus on reducing insulin resistance rather than just reducing blood sugar levels for long-term diabetes management success.
The effort to reverse your own type 2 diabetes by improving your sensitivity to insulin through weight-loss, becoming more active, and eating a diet that is lower in processed foods and higher in whole foods and fewer carbs will likely benefit anyone.
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Symptoms Of Untreated Type 2 Diabetes
- Fatigue
- Include fermented foods twice or thrice a day
- Take probiotic and oral biotic to help heal your digestive system
- Break a sweat thrice or four times a day
- Include HIIT and strength training twice a week
- Try intermittent fasting by skipping breakfast once or twice a week
Visit your nearest Apollo Sugar Clinics for a complete comprehensive diabetes treatment and diabetes care. Get help from our team of experts that include nutritionists and dieticians who will customize a diabetic diet chart to suit your needs, along with our doctors and physical therapists who will suggest a workout plan that will give you the most benefit to better your condition of weight loss in type 2 diabetes.
Dietitian Tips To Help Reach Remission For Prediabetes Or Type 2 Diabetes
“Achieving remission of type 2 diabetes may not be possible for everyone. It depends on how long you have been living with diabetes and several other factors. Every body is different and each situation is unique. Since A1C tests measure blood sugar over two to three months, testing more often won’t allow you to see major changes,” Harris-Pincus says.
If you’ve been diagnosed with prediabetes or type 2 diabetes by your doctor, consider these next steps to increase the chances of remission.
1. Meet with a dietitian. Most health insurance policies cover visits to a registered dietitian for diabetes counseling, Harris-Pincus says. “Teaming up with a nutrition expert will help you customize a plan to initiate impactful diet and lifestyle changes to improve your blood sugar and overall health,” she explains.
2. Time it right. “Eating more of your calories earlier in the day has been shown to improve blood sugar and insulin levels,” Harris-Pincus explains. That’s because most bodies tend to process carbohydrates better earlier in the day compared to later in the evening. Try to make breakfast or lunch your largest meal of the day, then end with a smaller dinner.
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We’re All Too Familiar Now With The Devastating Impact Of Covid
I have worked as a diabetes specialist for more than 30 years. For 20 of those years I, along with everyone else in the diabetes field, believed that it was a progressive condition. Patients were advised to base every meal around starchy carbohydrates and take medication in the hope of halting its progress, which meant they avoided ill health as a result of complications.
How Do You Reverse Diabetes
The strongest evidence we have at the moment suggests that type 2 diabetes is mainly put into remission by weight loss. Remission is more likely if you lose weight as soon as possible after your diabetes diagnosis. However, we do know of people who have put their diabetes into remission 25 years after diagnosis.
If you have obesity, your diabetes is more likely to go into remission if you lose a substantial amount of weight 15kg as quickly and safely as possible following diagnosis.
Its important to know that not everyone who loses this much weight will be able to put their diabetes into remission. But losing 15kg comes with a lot of health benefits, even if you dont lead to remission. Research shows that getting support to lose just 5% of your body weight can have huge benefits for your health. Losing extra weight can lead to:
fewer medications
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Diagnosis Classification And Etiology Of Diabetes
Currently, the American Diabetes Association recommends the use of any of the following four criteria for diagnosing diabetes: 1) glycated hemoglobin value of 6.5% or higher, 2) fasting plasma glucose 126 mg/dl , 3) 2-h plasma glucose 200 mg/dl during an oral glucose tolerance test using 75 g of glucose, and/or 4) classic symptoms of hyperglycemia or hyperglycemic crisis with a random plasma glucose of 200 mg/dl or higher. In the absence of unequivocal hyperglycemia, the first three criteria should be confirmed by repeat testing . Prediabetes is diagnosed with an A1C of 5.76.4%, fasting plasma glucose of 100125 mg/dl , or 2-h postload glucose of 140199 mg/dl .
The major forms of diabetes can be categorized as type 1 or type 2 . In type 1 diabetes, which accounts for 510% of cases, the cause is an absolute deficiency of insulin secretion resulting from autoimmune destruction of the insulin-producing cells in the pancreas. Type 2 diabetes results from a combination of the inability of muscle cells to respond to insulin properly and inadequate compensatory insulin secretion. Less common forms include gestational diabetes mellitus , which is associated with a 4060% chance of developing type 2 diabetes in the next 510 years . Diabetes can also result from genetic defects in insulin action, pancreatic disease, surgery, infections, and drugs or chemicals .
Myth #: Once You Start Insulin Injections You Cant To Go Back
Though sometimes necessary, insulin is not always a great solution because it leads to increased weight gain, blood pressure, and cholesterol.
Even though insulin helps blood sugar, it increases appetite, and increases inflammation. So it should be a last resort and taken at as low a dosage as possible.
Diet and lifestyle intervention can prevent you going on insulin and can also reverse insulin therapy, meaning you CAN get off insulin if you take the right steps. Weve seen many members decrease their dosage significantly.
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Remission In Ethnically Diverse And Global Populations
Most participants in studies on remission of type 2 diabetes carried out in western countries have been white, and background nutritional patterns of other ethnicities have to be considered.751 The Look-Ahead study included around 38% ethnic minority participants . Although not a primary aim of the study, remission of type 2 diabetes was observed in proportion to weight loss at year 1 and 7.3% at year 4, with weight loss of 8.6% and 4.7%, respectively) no association of ethnicity with remission was observed.11 A large community based analysis from the Kaiser Permanente Northern California Registry showed a higher likelihood of remission in African Americans than in the white population, with overall seven year remission of 4.6% among people with type 2 diabetes for less than two years.52 A similar retrospective survey of people aged over 65 years observed higher rates of non-surgical remission after eight years in Asian and Hispanic people than in white and African American groups.53
Food Fitness And Prevention Of Diabetes
Bottom Line: There is much we can do with a healthy lifestyle alone, no medications needed, to prevent diabetes, states Dr. James Barnard, Distinguished Professor Emeritus at UCLA and author of more than 200 studies on the relationship between lifestyle habits and chronic diseases like diabetes.
In fact, a healthy lifestyle has proven more effective than medication in staving off diabetes.
Lifestyle changes, like those taught at the Pritikin Center, are nearly twice as effective as medication in preventing pre-diabetes from turning into diabetes.
In a landmark study, the NIH-sponsored Diabetes Prevention Program2, scientists followed 3,234 men and women with pre-diabetes for three years.
One-third of them adopted lifestyle changes that were similar to the Pritikin Program: a daily eating plan of low-calorie-dense, high-fiber foods exercising for at least 30 minutes five days a week and a 7% weight loss.
Another third of these pre-diabetics took a drug metformin .
The remaining third, the control group, took a placebo.
The results? Those on the lifestyle-change plan reduced the progression to full-blown type 2 diabetes by 58% compared to the control group. The reduction was even greater 71% among those aged 60 years or older.
Treatment with the drug metformin reduced the progression to type 2 diabetes by just 31%.
Put simply, lifestyle changes were nearly twice as effective as medication in preventing pre-diabetes from turning into diabetes.
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The Story Of The Pima Indians
Research has found3 that the Pima Indians are a perfect example of how powerfully our environment can dictate who gets obese and diabetic, and who doesnt.
Today, two main groups of Pima Indians live on earth. The first group lives high in the Sierra Madre Mountains of Mexico a rural environment. The second group lives in Arizona on the Gila River reservation. Both groups are thought to be genetically identical. Scientists estimate they were separated about 700 to 1,000 years ago. For DNA evolutionary development, thats a mere pittance of time.
But physically, the two groups today could not be more different.
Should We Pick Up Plows And Return To The 19th Century
Of course not. But we can learn a lesson from the Amish in the Lancaster area of Pennsylvania, notes Gomer.
They shun all modern conveniences. Theyre physically active throughout the day, growing and producing their own foods in much the same way their ancestors did 150 years ago. While the Amish diet is a lot higher in fatty dairy products than the Pritikin Eating Plan or the U.S. Dietary Guidelines would recommend, only about 3% of the Amish are overweight, and almost none is obese.
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