Posted on 10/20/2012 10:35:47 AM PDT by Innovative
A large federal study of whether diet and weight loss can prevent heart attacks and strokes in overweight and obese people with Type 2 diabetes has ended two years ahead of schedule because the intensive program did not help.
About 25 million Americans have Type 2 diabetes. Many are overweight or obese. On average, the disease increases heart disease risk by 2 to 2 1/2 times, said Dr. Ronald Kahn, chief academic officer at the Joslin Diabetes Center in Boston.
Dr. Nathan, though, said the results meant that people with diabetes might have a choice. The group assigned to diet and exercise ended up with about the same levels of cholesterol, blood pressure and blood sugar as those in the control group, but the dieters used fewer medications.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
In my personal opinion medical science today still doesn't know the original cause of diabetes and have a lot of misconceptions.
Another interesting study:
Heart failure patients with diabetes may benefit from higher glucose levels
http://www.uclahealth.org/body.cfmid=561&action=detail&ref=1880
“The researchers found that for the diabetic heart failure patients, two-year event-free survival was highest among patients with the highest elevated glycosylated hemoglobin levels: a 65 percent survival rate for patients with Level 4 (greater than 8.6 percent of the marker) and a 61 percent survival rate for those with Level 3 (7.3 - 8.5 percent of the marker).
Patients with lower levels of the marker had worse survival rates: a 48 percent survival rate for patients with Level 1 (less than 6.4 percent of the marker) and a 42 percent survival rate for those with Level 2 (6.5 - 7.2 percent of the marker).
According to the researchers, the ideal level of glycosylated hemoglobin in heart failure patients with diabetes appears to be in the 8.3 - 8.9 percent range. Current national treatment targets aim much lower, at 7 percent.”
If I recall correctly, you have a health/diabetes ping list...
At least some overweight people with Type 2 diabetes have their blood sugars return to normal if they lose weight.It happened to me.I was told to lose 30 pounds and did so.Once that weight was gone I was taken off my diabetes medication *and* I was taken off all but one of my blood pressure meds and the one that wasn't discontinued was reduced to the lowest recommended dose.I asked my doctor about it and he said that it was very common to see those results after a noteworthy weight loss.
More:
“Published online in the American Journal of Cardiology, the study by UCLA researchers compared levels of glycosylated hemoglobin, a marker used to track glucose levels, in advanced heart failure patients with and without diabetes. The marker is gauged through a simple blood test.
The study assessed the relationship between levels of the marker and mortality outcomes. Researchers found that among heart failure patients with diabetes, there was a 15 percent decrease in mortality for every unit increase in the marker.”
So my laziness is paying off!
Oh but they didn’t consult Doctor Mooshell!
She has all the dietary answers. What a waste of time. They could have made an appointment with her, and saved themselves all that trouble.
Just another example of government waste.
Paging Doctor Mooshell, Doctor Mooshell please pick up the pinko courtesy phone.
Good for you.
But I know people who lost 100 lbs and didn’t make a darn bit of difference in their diabetes, cholesterol and blood pressure.
I think genetics is more important than lifestyle.
They should study people who don’t get these diseases despite their “unhealthy” lifestyles.
Also knew people who were thin, exercised, ate healthy and died of a heart attack when middle-aged.
Did the study mention whether the lower A1C levels were achieved using higher dosages of insulin? Higher insulin levels have been linked to higher heart disease risks. It’s way more complicated than just sugar level alone.
What sort of ‘diet’ were the dieters on?
The article indicates that people with type 2 diabetes have a 2 to 2.5 times likelihood of having a cardiac event. This is typically misleading. In the big scheme of things, the increase of risk may be from 2% to 4 or 5% which provides a little bit better perspective.
They put these people on starvation diets which they did NOT maintain and their weight loss was negligible.
Some study!
I’ve heard that people who weigh 700+ pounds rarely die of heart disease because they have to have genes that make them immune to heart attacks in the first place to get that fat without dying. Could be seeing a similar effect here.
Was it a low fat diet or a low sugar diet? There is a difference. One works and one does not.
“It’s way more complicated than just sugar level alone.”
I agree. Insulin and many medications that are given to lower blood sugar are listed as potentially causing heart failure.
People get diabetes — take meds causing heart failure — then they have heart failure and continue to take the same meds which aggravate it — the more meds they take, the more their blood sugar is lowered, but the larger amounts of meds are what is causing a higher level or mortality.
I agree with you about genetics. I knew a woman who was in her 70's, she was thin, and exercised and the only meat she ate was boneless, skinless chicken breasts. She had high cholesterol numbers, and last I talked to her, her doctor had put her on two cholesterol medicines because just one wasn't helping with her cholesterol numbers. There I sat, overweight, my exercise routine was walking around the mall a couple of times, and I am a Atkins type of person. My bp and cholesterol are both just fine.
300 lb. individuals lost an average of 15 pounds? And the now trim, fit 285 pound individuals saw no significant effect on the incidence of heart attacks and strokes? Somehow, I am not shocked to learn this.
I recall several years ago that a major state university released a study that broccoli was good for you.
That state university's ag department has several thousand acres of crops under cultivation. Care to guess what one of their major crops was?
“I think genetics is more important than lifestyle.”
***
High cholesterol runs on both sides of my family. I can control mine somewhat, but I’ve accepted the fact that no matter what I do, I will never have normal cholesterol. I doubt too many people with a similar family history will either.
I think if anything we find that a one-size-fits-all mentality in medicine is what leads to ineffective (wasteful, unnecessary, sometimes harmful) treatment for many, many people.
Simply because not everyone’s bodies run at the same levels as others.
Look at the freaking eskimos. Cholesterol through the roof. they live well into old age. Environment and lifestyle and genetics and exposure to various other bacteria/virii all play a part and one-size-fits-all just don’t work.
The top pharma guys have admitted in interviews the most popular drugs work in only roughly half the people that take them, doesn’t do anything positive for the rest. They know this from their own studies.
Vaccines. Don’t get me started. The mega study that looked at over 20 studies across 50 years of the flu shot just showed that the shot only decreased chances of getting the flu by 4%. How effing great is that? It also destroyed the whole herd immunity bs argument as well.
Hell they can’t even figure out if eggs are good for you or not. they were, then they weren’t, then they were again.
The extra stress and unnecessary pressure the “medical experts” have put regular folks through, is enormous. Iatrogenic deaths in America are in the hundreds of thousands a year. Someone may be listed as having a heart attack asa cause of death, but what about the cause of the cause - like arterial calcification from statins, or the negative interactions of multiple medicines in the body (not yet discovered, maybe never)?
I am one of those people who lost a great deal of weight. 80lbs. Have kept most if it off for the past 9 years. Losing that much weight did NOTHING for my sugar levels. The same amount of carbs raise my sugars the same amount postprandially they did before I lost weight. So I stopped eating things that raised my blood sugar (think wheat belly diet). My last a1c was 4.8 No meds. I have the option of taking metformin, which I do from time to time. Not necessarily to help with sugar levels although it does do that.
I still have about 35-40lbs to lose but my blood work continues to be excellent and my last stress test was superb.
YMMV.
A really good book that explains why low-carb is not only the best way to maintain proper weight, but also the most heart healthy diet:
Both Mom and Grandma told us that eating too much sugar would give you diabetes. Still think its a fact or at least a big contributor.
Big deal. They lost only 5% of their weight? Doesn’t sound like they were very compliant subjects.
No surprise, these obese people were not exercising and definitely not sticking to that diet. LOL
It all boils down to portion size and exercise.
I’m adopted and thus have no family history, but I know that at 100 lbs lighter I got off three meds, and my quality of life (maybe the biggest bonus of all) is far and away better. I’m 47 and have to keep up with a toddler as I became an old first time dad last year. I no longer have high BP or type 2 diabetes.
To me, diet and exercise have always been quality of life issues, as opposed to longevity.
We once joked about turning her black koi in the backyard pond into instant fresh sashimi!
"Some study!"
I agree. An 11 year study -- if participants were getting 1200-1800 calories a day and "intense" exercise they should all look like Senior Olympics athletes after about one year -- not lose 5% of their weight after 11 years. I realize the devil is in the details, and the article hasn't been written yet --but it's obvious that something is very wrong with this study.
Or, perhaps, opportune infections that get a toehold when an old person's immunity is weakened by a flu shot?
Most East Indians are vegetarian and they have fairly long life spans.
http://newsfeed.time.com/2012/10/18/worlds-oldest-dad-96-fathers-another-child/
I don’t suppose they mentioned any benefits of chocolate covered donuts!!!
As a type 2 diabetic, i’m not sure they even know with a high degree of certainty what it is. They know symptoms and can do some measuring that provides numbers. They can then correlate those numbers with various maladies.
I can testify that weight loss of about 15% and transition from a obese to overweight biomass yields decrease in various critical numbers. Those numbers already controlled to “normal” by drugs were reduced further by the diet and exercise. Diet meaning reduce carbs. Exercise meaning do something physical to raise your heart rate every day.
A primary difference is the elimination or serious reduction in acid indigestion. Sleep patterns change, more sleep, lest wakefulness at night.
The malfunction is complex and I believe related to all the various numbers being high not just blood sugar/A1c. Although still on the high end of over weight, I feel much better when I don’t eat too many carbs and get some vigorous exercise. The serious exercise I now face is raking leaves probably till the end of January
Thanks for the ping, Innovative. This is the main reason I still check out the NY Times. It's hard to beat its health and science section. This study was stopped after 11 years. You can't beat the drugs, but diet and exercise can save you the cost of the drugs and any adverse effects from the drugs.
FReepmail me if you want on or off the diabetes ping list.
Well, I don’t know much about east indians.
But I have known easily over 100 90+ year olds and none of them ever in their lives did ANY of the things that supposedly help you live longer (exercise, vegatarian, ect)
They were all just normal people, living normal lives, most were gardeners and liked working with their hands type jobs
If all this excercise hype were true, then the ranks of the elderly would be filled with body builders and athletes and health food nuts.
bfl
Just from personal observation of the older people in my life, I've found that those who accepted every offer of a prescribed drug had an earlier and more severe mental deterioration than those who tried to limit their use and used vitamins
Congratulations!!
The fallacy in your thought is that those who lived to be 90+ did not experience prolonged overabundance of both food and leisure/sedentary lives.
The diabetic epidemic if there is one is experienced by the children and grand children of those of whom you speak.
Their lives were more like humans of old who lived lives requiring more exercise just to live and who did not have Doritos or all the chicken and meat and fries and..... they could want. The problem with abundance is that it is contrary to the genetic programming of tens of thousands of years of evolutionary biology.
My FRiend, I can guarantee you, that those 90+ year olds didn’t have to “do” any exercize, because their life WAS full of exercise! We need to to exercise today because our lifestyles are sedentary compared to those of yesterday.
OK. How’d you do it? I am STARVED all the time; with winter coming and stress out the wazoo. How? I need to lose 25 or 30 lbs.
Yep. Somehow I think that the area of nutrition, diet, weight loss and health is not the medical community's forté.
I think the problem is that the human body tries to resist gradual change, so adapts to such schemes and adjusts for them.
Compare this to the radical approach to diabetes, in which, hospitalized for their own protection, diabetics were put on 600 calorie a day diets for eight weeks.
http://diabetes.webmd.com/news/20110624/very-low-calorie-diet-may-reverse-diabetes
It was too fast for the body to adapt, so they shed a lot of weight quickly, including the fat that had been inhibiting their insulin production.
now THAT I will agree with.
All the seniors I have ever known were fairly active, doing things like gardening, crafts, carpentry, ect.
none of them sat around on their butts all day
But they weren’t running marathons, lifting weights, chewing on celery and carrots exclusively all day or had 1% body fat and a six pack.
Congratulations. Especially that young tot! Life changing aren’t they? Never thought you’d love something, someone that much huh? ;D!
Read the book, followed the diet.
To kick start the diet, I ate 200 calories of no-carb food every two hours, except for dinner. For dinner I ate medium portions of what everyone else was eating (except no dessert), and half a medium portion of the starchy food. I did this for two weeks to wean myself off sweets and starches, and to shrink my stomach. Then I went no-carb/high fat.
I've lost 35 pounds since June and I'm never hungry. I also eat very small portions, frequently. I'm munching on pepperoni as I type.
1) I was very motivated (long story)
2) I love to walk and live near a mall that's great for walking
3) I had a good amount of free time during that period.
OK...
1) Atkins.Strict Atkins.Much,much easier to stick with than I expected.There's a physiological reason for that which my doctor (who's on the staff of a major Boston hospital) explained to me.In short,it's because of all the protein you're eating.
2) Lots of walking,every day,"Power walking"...meaning almost running.At least 1 1/2 hours a day,usually 2.In good weather I walked outside,in bad weather I walked at the mall.
So,with all that it took me about 2 1/2 months to lose 20 pounds and another 1 1/2 months to lose the last 10.When finished I was just within the "normal" range for my BMI (27,IIRC).And I felt better than I had since graduating from Army basic training.
I totally agree about that book! It will scare you off carbs for life. I already had to give up gluten because I was diagnosed with celiac disease a year ago and I lost about 30 pounds from that alone. But I had stalled out and my diet was incredibly rich in starches.
I read Why We Get Fat and immediately stopped starches, greatly reduced my carbs, increased my fats and I lost 13 pounds in 5 weeks! That’s super fast for me. With the knowledge of that book, it’s no wonder this study didn’t work.
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