The rise in people with type 2 diabetes is a major medical concern around the world. Currently, more than 6% of the adult population lives in this state, and is projected to rise to around 7% by 2030.
Type 2 diabetes is often preventable, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Maintaining a healthy weight and getting enough exercise is an effective way to help prevent prediabetes that are higher than the recommended blood sugar level when your body becomes resistant to insulin, and develops type 2 diabetes.
Now, new research provides further evidence that exercise can reduce the risk of developing type 2 diabetes.
David Cutler, a board-certified family medicine physician at Providence St. John's Health Center in Santa Monica, California, explained today's medical news.
“The health consequences of having diabetes are severe. The risk of almost all diseases, including heart attacks, strokes, renal failure, vascular disease, blindness, infections, etc. These diseases lead to early death and significantly impair the quality of life before death for diabetics. The wise thing to do is to prevent pre-diabetes or reverse it if it already exists.”
The researchers analyzed data from 130 people who enrolled in the cardiovascular risk program at the Kali referral center in Colombia between 2019 and 2023.
All participants were 69.5 years old and over 18 years old, with over half of them female. Almost half had overweight or obese (average BMI of 26.7), and four-quarters had hypertension (hypertension). A total of 57.7% of the cohort reported exercising more than 150 minutes a week.
At the start of the 1-year follow-up, all participants were prediabetic and had glycated hemoglobin (HBA1C-Glucose Control Scale) of 5.9% (health levels were <5.7%, type 2 diabetes was >6.5%).
HBA1C is a better predictor of cardiovascular metabolic risk than fasting blood glucose tests, as it is a marker of glucose control for three months prior to testing.
All participants were regularly assessed by internal medicine, nutrition, psychology, and physical therapy specialists. The specialists also measured insulin resistance using the glucose/triglyceride index. This is a factor in prediabetics.
During follow-up, 21.5% of participants returned to normal blood glucose levels, 13.8% progressed to type 2 diabetes, and 64.6% remained prediabetic.
Physical activity over 150 minutes a week had a statistically significant effect on the likelihood of reversing prediabetes and quadratured the likelihood of returning to normal blood glucose levels.
“This research clearly reinforces what doctors have been telling patients for a long time. Diet, weight management and exercise are key ingredients in a long, healthy lifestyle.
– David Cutler, MD
After the researchers adjusted for possible bias, they identified the following factors that reduce the likelihood of reversing prediabetes:
Cutler told MNT, “General everyday medical practices highlight three approaches to controlling or reversing pre-diabetes: a hypoglycemic diet to lower blood sugar; [then] calorie restriction, dietary modification or drug weight loss, and [finally] exercise. “
“[This] A recent study of 130 prediabetic adults in Cali, Colombia confirmed these assumptions. Furthermore, it highlighted the significant impact that even a modest amount of exercise could have,” he added.
However, Cutler said, “Even this controlled study providing cutting-edge diet, weight loss and exercise resources, only 21.5% of subjects were in remission. What's more, 64.6% remained diabetic. [and] 13.8% continued to develop type 2 diabetes. ”
In addition to exercising more than 150 minutes a week, keeping HBA1C levels below 6.0% was the most important factor that researchers identified by increasing the likelihood of reversing pre-diabetes.
This is related to the level of insulin resistance measured by researchers using the glucose/triglyceride index.
As pre-diabetic reversal was not so common in patients with high glucose/triglyceride indexes, researchers suggest that measurement of glucose/triglyceride indexes may be a cost-effective method to predict the risk of desalination and type 2 diabetes.
Lucy Chambers, head of Research Impact and Communications in Diabetes UK, who was not involved in the study, spoke to MNT and heard an optimistic note.
“Pre-diabetes can feel like you're heading down the path towards Type 2 diabetes, but you still have time to make a U-turn. While you can't change risk factors such as age, genetics, ethnicity, etc., it consistently shows that increasing physical activity, weight gain and weight management can reduce the risk of Type 2 diabetes by half. Health.”