Diabetes/Metabolic Syndrome Archives

Another study attests to the value of a lower GI diet in the management of diabetes

Friday, May 2nd, 2008

When working with nutritionally-based medicine, one gets a feel over the years for what tends to work and what doesn’t. One thing I’ve learned to be fairly certain of is that when an diabetic individual who is eating the mounds of carb so often recommended to them switches to a diet with less carb […]

Study links fruit juice consumption with increased risk of diabetes

Monday, April 28th, 2008

While fruit juices have a healthy reputation, I don’t believe their as healthy as their image suggests. Some of the issues I have with them are detailed here. One key property of fruit juices that causes me to advise their consumption with caution is the fact that they tend to be very sugary indeed. […]

Doctors detail the benefits of carbohydrate restriction in diabetics

Monday, April 14th, 2008

Something interesting came in the post today, though I’m not sure who it has come from because the person who sent it marked it with their email address only. The item is a photocopy from what I think is a book, that seems to be called ‘Diabetes for Beginners’. The page (page 36) has […]

More evidence that insulin plays a role in the development of dementia

Friday, April 11th, 2008

Last month one of my posts was devoted to some research which found a link between weight accumulation around the mid-riff (abdominal obesity) and an increased risk of dementia. In this post, I also explored some of the mechanisms which might explain this association. At the heart of these suggested mechanisms is the hormone […]

Why big bellies could mean big trouble for brain function in later life

Friday, March 28th, 2008

Previously on this site I have presented evidence that the traditional way of assessing body weight – the body mass index (BMI) – is pretty useless as a marker for health. Part of the explanation for this lies in the fact that the BMI tells us nothing about the composition of the body. Neither […]

Combination of chromium and biotin found to benefit individuals with type 2 diabetes

Wednesday, March 26th, 2008

When it comes to blood sugar control, it makes sense to avoiding eating too much in the way of foods that tend to disrupt blood sugar levels. This is particularly true for diabetics whose bodies tend not to handle sugar at all well. However, in addition to eating a ‘carbohydrate-controlled’ diet, it can also […]

Green tea extract again found to help the body burn fat

Monday, March 17th, 2008

Back in December I reported on a study which found that supplementing men with an extract of green tea led to a significant reduction in their weight, waist size and ‘fat mass’.
The extract in question, which goes by the name of epigallocatechin-3-gallate (EGCG), is believed to boost metabolism by stimulating the burning of […]

Does vitamin D help protect against type 1 diabetes?

Friday, March 14th, 2008

I love being out in the sun. And not just because I like it, but also because of the abundant evidence linking sunlight exposure with a reduced risk of conditions such as cancer and multiple sclerosis as well as improved physical and psychological functioning. And it’s free. And I like sporting a tan.
I recently […]

New evidence links high-carb diets with increased risk of diabetes and other ills

Wednesday, March 12th, 2008

Variously on this site I, and quite a few commentators, have expressed concern for the conventional vogue of advising a diet rich in carbohydrate. Excesses of carbohydrate can cause gluts of the hormone insulin which in turn can predispose us to all sorts of problems including weight gain, type 2 diabetes, metabolic syndrome and […]

Study finds those eating low-fat diets with high insulin levels are most prone to weight gain

Wednesday, February 20th, 2008

It’s difficult to avoid the doom-laden statistics concerning rates of overweight and obesity. And at the same time we’ll no doubt be aware of the standard advice for those wanting to lose weight: ‘eat less and exercise more.’ The problem is, the evidence suggests that neither of these approaches is particularly effective for the […]

Why carbs can turn your liver into foie gras

Friday, February 15th, 2008

It’s funny how things seem to come in threes, and this week was an example of this maxim in that I saw three patients all of whom had deranged liver function tests. All of them had raised levels of at least two liver ‘enzymes’. This, in medicine, is generally taken as a sign of […]

More evidence (should you require it) that supports the notion that fat doesn’t induce diabetes, but carbs can

Wednesday, February 13th, 2008

Variously on the site in the past I have attempted to highlight the science (never mind the common sense) that if you have diabetes and want to control it (or don’t want to get this condition in the first place), the part of the diet that generally needs reigning in comes in the form […]

Study of aggressive drug treatment of diabetics halted due to enhanced risk of death

Friday, February 8th, 2008

When it comes to cholesterol and blood sugar levels and blood pressure, the general principle in medicine is ‘the lower the better’. The idea here is that the more suppressed these parameters are, the lower (supposedly) the risk of complications such as heart disease and stroke. However, as with everything in life, it’s […]

Meta-analysis show superiority of lower-carb diets in diabetes, but further studies said to be needed. Why?

Friday, January 11th, 2008

The primary problem sufferers of diabetes have is that their bodies don’t handle sugar (glucose) well. Part of the problem here is that ‘excess’ sugar in the body can attach itself to tissues, which damages them. As a result, diabetics are at an increased risk of a variety of conditions including nerve damage, blood […]

The Japanese eat rice. So what?

Monday, December 10th, 2007

My dislike of many starchy carbs like bread, potato, rice, pasta and breakfast cereals is based on a body of evidence which suggests that the gluts of insulin their eating induces can speed our path to conditions such as obesity and type 2 diabetes. And, despite all this talk about their ‘nutritious’ nature, the […]