Lifestyle Change Stops Diabetes

Type 2 diabetes is a stubborn disease to treat and leaves a lot of people feeling out of sync with life, and desperate for answers. Ever wonder, “How can I regain my energy and control those wildly high blood sugars.” Mayo clinic and other academic medical institutions concede the best way to control this disease is to start with lifestyle change. Diet and exercise are key.

Two Studies…

Here are two studies that give credence as to why we need lifestyle changes to control and prevent this disease. The first study took severely obese diabetic patients and put them on a calorie restricted diet for 1 week. At the end of one week of calorie restriction, blood tests revealed a marked increase in pancreatic function, lower blood sugars and decreased triglycerides.*
In 2002, the National Institutes of Health published results from the landmark Diabetes Prevention Program study in the New England Journal of Medicine. In the trial, 3,234 overweight people at risk of developing Type 2 diabetes were split into three groups to test whether lifestyle changes or the drug metformin could prevent the onset of diabetes.

• Group 1 received extensive training in diet and exercise, with goals of exercising 150 minutes per week and losing and keeping off 7% of their body weight.
• Group 2 received 850 milligrams of the diabetes drug metformin twice a day.
• Group 3 received placebo pills.

The Results?

• Moderate weight loss and regular exercise could prevent Type 2 diabetes.
• Those in Group 1 reduced their risk by 58%; members of this group who were 60 and older reduced their risk by 71%.
• Lifestyle intervention worked equally well across all ethnicities and both genders.
• Those in Group 2 reduced their risk by 31%; metformin was less effective at preventing diabetes in people older than 45.

What We’re Doing about Diabetes

Programs like NEWSTART here at Weimar that teach “lifestyle change” have helped reverse many type 2 diabetic patients’ disease. Through the diet and exercise learned here at NEWSTART many get off medications and these medications themselves may prove baleful with untoward side effects. NEWSTART helps people lose the weight that predisposes and causes diabetes.  The many walking trails here at Weimar prove a positive benefit to many and burn off unneeded pounds.
Calorie restriction here at NEWSTART is almost automatic as the food that is offered here is low calorie and full of nutrition in stark contrast to the caloric dense, high fat, average American diet, which is largely lacking in real nutrition. NEWSTART is truly a place where we educate people to live and eat for health.


* Am J Clin Nutr. 2012 Feb 8. Department of Medicine, University of Rome

Tags: Diabetes, Diet, Exercise, Lifestyle Change, NEWSTART, Reversing