Reversing the Diabetes Trend

In October 2010, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) projected that by the year 2050, as many as one-third of all adults in the U.S. could have diabetes. Despite the dire prediction, it’s quite possible to prevent, manage or even reverse diabetes.

According to one diabetes-prevention website, almost 60 million Americans are on the verge of becoming diabetic, while over 20 million already—about 8 percent of the U.S. population—have type 2 diabetes.

Type 2 diabetes accounts for approximately 90 percent of all diabetes diagnoses. Commonly referred to as a “lifestyle disease”, diabetes currently costs the global economy almost $400 billion per year.

That number is expected to jump to almost $500 billion in 20 years.

Diabetes, though, can usually be prevented, controlled, or possibly even reversed by:

• Managing blood sugar levels
• Losing weight
• Exercising
• Making dietary changes

In order to stem the tide of the diabetes epidemic, Al Pirnia, president of a diabetes-prevention company called Transformations, says that education and communication is crucial to managing and preventing diabetes.

“Every diabetes educator will encourage those with diabetes to lose weight and eat fewer carbohydrates, but what few people are saying is that you don’t need to have a huge belly in order to become pre-diabetic or diabetic,” says Pirnia.

Although it’s estimated that 80 percent of people with type 2 diabetes are obese, Pirnia says just a little extra abdominal fat can lead to a pre-diabetic condition.

“Just 10 pounds of extra abdominal fat,” he says, along with a stressful lifestyle that makes no time for exercise, “can get you over the top and make you become a diabetic,” cautions Pirnia.

More important than weight loss, says Pirnia, is educating people how to be in total control of their blood sugar.

“Diabetes is easy to correct at the early stage with simple food habit changes. Unfortunately, the [healthcare] system usually waits until it’s a disease condition before any action is taken,” Pirnia says.

Rather than educating the populace on how to regulate blood sugar levels, Pirnia claims that often times, a person’s blood sugar fasting levels are at 100 or even 110 before any comment is made by a healthcare professional.

Pirnia encourages those with pre-diabetic and diabetic conditions to frequently monitor blood sugar levels by using a self-administered glucometer.

Fasting blood sugar levels, says Pirnia, should not exceed 90.

Rather than simply telling someone with diabetes to modify their diet, Pirnia suggests educating those with diabetes on how to:

• Eat protein at every meal, including snacks
• Take a healthy snack between meals
• Never eat large meals full of starchy foods
• Learning, through use of the glucometer, which foods spike up blood sugar
• Eliminating or minimizing those foods which spike blood sugar
• Biochemically boosting the body’s fat burning process by adjusting carbohydrate to protein ratios
• Encourage hydrochloric acid (HCL) supplementation to support digestion and nutrient absorption
• Support healthy pancreatic function, especially those who have been on medication
• Educate pre-diabetics on the consequences of not changing their lifestyle

“It’s meaningless to tell someone, ‘lose weight’ if they are not going to learn how to burn abdominal fat,” says Pirnia.

“If people lose muscle mass when they lose weight, they are doing more harm than good. Furthermore, if those with diabetes or at risk of getting diabetes aren’t properly educated, they will just end up on medication and ultimately, their pancreas will be undermined or completely destroyed,” adds Pirnia, referring to the organ that secretes insulin to regulate blood sugar.

Failure to reverse diabetes could also lead to developing Alzheimer’s disease, certain cancers and heart disease, according to several contemporary studies.

The Gycemic Index scale, a measure of how quickly and for how long carbohydrates in a given food raises blood sugar levels, is one tool that nutritionists and dieticians frequently use to educate their clients.

But Thomas Wolever, Ph.D., a professor of nutritional sciences at the University of Toronto cautions that people often think that the GI tells you what your individual glycemic response will be all the time for a specific food.

“It doesn’t,” he says, in HealthCommunities.com’s Diabetes Focus.

“The GI of any food is consistent from day to day…what changes is a person’s response.”

For example, white bread has the same GI regardless. But if someone eats bread three days in a row, Wolever claims the GI response could vary by as much as three fold because of activity, stress levels, sleep quality, and what other foods have been eaten at other times of the day and at the same time as the bread.

The aforementioned Pirnia would no doubt educate those interested in managing their diabetes to avoid white bread at all costs.

“The bottom line,” says Pirnia, “is to empower people to learn how to manage and be in control of their blood sugar so they can impact their need for medication if they are already a diabetic, and for those who are pre-diabetic to never become a diabetic.”

Judd Handler is an Encinitas, CA-based health reporter and wellness consultant.