Research presented at the International Congress of Endocrinology and European Congress of Endocrinology shows that people who eat fast have a 2.5-times higher risk of Type 2 diabetes, compared with slower eaters.

"The prevalence of Type 2 diabetes is increasing globally and becoming a world pandemic. It appears to involve interaction between susceptible genetic backgrounds and environmental factors," study researcher Dr. Lina Radzeviciene, of the Lithuanian University of Health Sciences, said in a statement. "It's important to identify modifiable risk factors that may help people reduce their chances of developing the disease."

Researchers from Lithuania compared 234 people with type 2 diabetes and 468 people without the disease and found that those who gobble down their food were 2.5 times more likely to have diabetes than those who take their time while eating.

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Inflammation is associated with many diabetes-related complications, such as heart disease.

The study included 54 people — 15 obese, 12 with impaired glucose tolerance (pre-diabetes), 18 with type 2 diabetes, and 9 healthy and not obese — who ate a high-fat meal after an overnight fast.

The researchers compared levels of endotoxins in the participants' blood before and after they ate the meal. Endotoxins are bacterial fragments that enter the bloodstream from the gut and are associated with inflammation and heart disease.

All the participants had elevated endotoxin levels after eating the fatty meal, but levels in those with type 2 diabetes were significantly higher than in the healthy, non-obese people, according to the study, which was scheduled for presentation Tuesday at the Society for Endocrinology's annual meeting in England.

Although the research doesn't show cause and effect, the findings could explain one way that obesity and type 2 diabetes can lead to inflammatory damage in blood vessels and other tissues, and help scientists develop new ways to prevent this damage.

"High-fat, low-carbohydrate diets are often promoted to patients with type 2 diabetes as they have been suggested to aid weight loss and control blood sugar, but if confirmed in larger studies, our data show that being healthy is not just about losing weight, as these particular diets could increase inflammation in some patients and with it the risk of heart disease," lead investigator Alison Harte, a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Warwick in England, said in a Society for Endocrinology news release.

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Harvard School of Public Health researchers reviewed the findings of four previous studies conducted in the United States, Australia, China and Japan. None of the participants had diabetes at the start of the studies. Overall, the trials included more than 350,000 participants tracked anywhere from four to 22 years.

Researchers led by Qi Sun found a strong association between eating white rice and type 2 diabetes, and the link was stronger in women than in men, according to the study published online March 15 in the British Medical Journal.

The more white rice a person ate, the greater his or her risk for diabetes. For example, for each serving of white rice (assuming 158 grams/6 ounces per serving) there was a 10 percent increased risk of diabetes, the Harvard team estimated.

Compared to brown rice, the white variety has lower levels of nutrients such as fiber, magnesium and vitamins, the team noted. Intake of some of these nutrients are also associated with lowering a person's risk of diabetes, the researchers said.

White rice — the main type of rice eaten worldwide — also scores high on the glycemic index (GI), a measure of how foods affect blood sugar levels. High GI diets are associated with an increased risk of type 2 diabetes, the research team said.

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There's nothing fair about juvenile diabetes, but a fair-type atmosphere at United Regional Health Care Center recently gave youngsters and their parents a chance to look at the lighter side of managing their condition while living a full life.

Diabetes educators set up spin-and-win games, tests of knowledge and a particularly interesting display of medical artifacts.

"A patient from Vernon donated these, hoping to give these kids a chance to see the things he used to manage his blood sugar when he was their age," said Denise Blair, who helped found United Regional's first diabetes support group in 1995. "It's hard for them to imagine using a blood test lancet that looks like a little guillotine or a meter the size of an old cassette tape recorder."

Brock Ramsey, 12, and his mother, Brenda, were fascinated. Brock was diagnosed with Type 1 a year ago and with the help of an insulin pump and conscientious monitoring, he's active in athletics, a member of the football team and the second tallest student in his class.

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Researchers at the Kaiser Permanente Division of Research in Oakland, California, studied 580 ethnically diverse women who took part in a multiphasic health checkup at Kaiser Permanente Northern California between 1984 and 1996. The researchers looked at women who had a subsequent pregnancy and compared those who developed gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) during pregnancy to women who did not have GDM.

The study found that the risk of GDM increased directly with the number of adverse risk factors present before pregnancy that are commonly associated with diabetes and heart disease: high blood sugar, hypertension, and being overweight. In addition, the authors found that adverse levels of blood sugar and body weight were associated with a 4.6-fold increased risk of GDM, compared to women with normal levels.

The study is among the first to look at routinely measured cardio-metabolic risk factors before pregnancy in women who later became pregnant and developed GDM. It provides evidence to support pre-conception care that leads to healthy pregnancies, as called for in a 2006 report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That report suggested that risk factors for adverse outcomes among women and infants can be identified prior to conception and are characterized by the need to start, and sometimes finish, interventions before conception occurs.  

Study participants were given a goal to eat either six or eight daily servings of foods with a low glycemic index -carbohydrates that are digested slowly and are less likely to spike blood-sugar levels than would carbohydrates with a high glycemic index.

Overall, most participants reached the eight-serving goal, partly because researchers discovered that many people were already consuming about six servings of low-glycemic-index foods each day.

The participants also ate about 500 fewer daily calories and added vegetables, fruits and nuts and seeds to their diet – all foods that are on the low end of the glycemic index.

Participants' confidence about being able to meet these dietary recommendations was key to their ability to reach the goal. People who had more confidence about the goal were more committed, and higher commitment levels led to a better likelihood that they would reach the goal.

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A Canadian research article points out that beta glucan fiber creates highly viscous solutions in the upper digestive tract, fermentation in the colon, and subsequent prebiotic effects by selective metabolism in the gastrointestinal tract. This biochemical cascade results in laxation, significant improvements in both serum lipid levels and postprandial glycemia, and increased satiety.

Researchers argue that the dosage, food form, interaction with satiety, and molecular weight of beta glucan determine the way in which glycemia is regulated in patients with diabetes. For example, a study showed that when individuals with abnormal cholesterol levels ingested five grams per day of beta glucan in beverage form, their glucose and insulin responses improved significantly after five weeks. On the other hand, incorporation of beta glucan in pasta did not significantly reduce postprandial glucose levels.

“It’s critical that people with diabetes pay attention to their heart health,” said registered dietitian Kathy McManus, director of nutrition at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. “They should combine a healthy complex carbohydrate with some protein and a little bit of healthy fat for meals and snacks. They should also avoid trans fats and limit saturated fats.” Learn what’s good and what’s bad with the Fats 101.

Shop smart


When grocery shopping, plan ahead for the week and always bring a list — and a full stomach.

“Stay on the perimeter of the store, and stock up on seasonal produce that’s on sale,” McManus said. “Not everything has to be fresh. Plain, frozen vegetables and fruits can be easy and convenient substitutes.”

Look for whole-grain, high-fiber, unprocessed foods and limit your time on the aisles where there are boxed foods that may not be healthy. Take a close look at serving size and salt and sugar content.

“We all need to be sensitive to the added sodium and added sugar in packaged, processed and take-out foods,” McManus said. Avoid products with too much sucrose, honey and high fructose corn syrup.

Be wary of buy-one get-one free deals, because if they’re not healthy, you’re getting more than you bargained for.

Balance your plate


Ready for dinner? Your best bet is to start with a small plate. Fill half of it with vegetables such as roasted squash, grilled asparagus or a salad.
For the next quarter, consider a healthy carb like a small, plain sweet potato, brown rice, whole-wheat couscous or whole-grain pasta.
Finish off your plate with a lean protein, like a piece of fish, poultry without the skin or a very lean cut of meat.

Dining out


When dining out, call ahead or look online to find out what’s on the menu. Avoid buffets, because the value to your pocketbook won’t be felt in your waistline.

Based on your current numbers such as blood sugar, weight and blood pressure, you'll discover what you can do to reduce your risk of CVD. The American Heart Association can provide you with personalized action plans to help you make lifestyle changes and lower your risk of CVD.

It only takes a few minutes to change your life.

Furthermore, the company did not submit a plan of correction to promptly report cases in which the devices might have caused or contributed to death or serious injury. Some patients who used the faulty pumps were hospitalized with dangerously high blood sugar, respiratory failure, and coma, as well as a diabetic ketoacidosis, a potentially fatal condition.
 

Still, I was a little nervous about the flight from Chicago. When your life depends on insulin injections, it's easy to become stressed at the thought of losing your lifeline. Where would I keep my syringes, my insulin, and my testing supplies? I certainly couldn't pack them in my checked baggage. If they got lost, I'd be in big trouble in the "Big Apple."

The airline regulations seemed to be getting stricter by the day, and I had no idea what rules I would encounter with my insulin and supplies. My doctor gave me a prescription noting that I was diabetic and needed to carry my insulin and syringes with me. I packed, headed to the airport, and informed security of my type 1 diabetes.

The young security gentleman looked at me holding my doctor's note and bag full of supplies and said, "Oh, you're pretty, so you're fine," as he waved me through without bothering to read the note. He probably meant it as a compliment, but I was not amused or flattered by the lack of security.

Researchers from the Cancer Therapy and Research Center at UT Health Science Center San Antonio, the American Association for Cancer Research, and Baylor College of Medicine followed 88 women, all at high risk for breast cancer based on family histories. One third of the women ate a Mediterranean-type diet that restricted calories to about 1,500 per day. The second group was told to eat normally most of the time, but two days a week to cut carbs and also reduce calories to about 650. The third group also cut carbs two days a week, but had no calorie restrictions.

Gina Keatley is an award-winning chef, nutritionist, and humanitarian. Utilizing her professional and educational experiences, Gina has become known for her food-focused television appearances, cookbooks and her campaign against the use of processed foods in low-income areas. Gina holds a Bachelors of Science degree in Nutrition and Food Studies from New York University and holds a degree in Restaurant Management and Culinary Arts from the Art Institute of New York City. Her professional experience spans the food world; she has worked in hunger management as the founder of her own community food program, as a culinary consultant, food writer and fine dining professional. Gina's specialty is Italian cuisine, although she has a broad international repertoire.

Gina has been featured on such programs and networks as the Food Network, the Dr. Oz Show, AFP Global News Network, ABC Channel 7 New York City, and many more, performing on air culinary and nutrition demonstrations for local and national broadcasts. She is the proud founder and creator of Nourishing NYC, a community food program that feeds, educates, and advocates for tens-of-thousands of in need families annually; and is planning a nationwide expansion in late 2011. Gina is a culinary writing contributor to several food and lifestyle website, magazines and digital based content and is proud to be debuting her inspirational weight loss/moneysaving cookbook in 2012.

Statins have been proven to prevent second heart attacks, but not first heart attacks. Take it if you already have had one, but beware if your doctor recommends it for you if have never had a heart attack.

This current study adds to an increasing body of literature questioning the benefits of statins, while highlighting their potential risks.

New Study Shows 48 Percent Risk of Diabetes in Women Who Take Statins

This study examined the data from the large government sponsored study called the Women's Health Initiative, the same study that disabused us of the idea that Premarin prevented heart attacks in postmenopausal women.

In fact, based on this randomized controlled trial, estrogen replacement therapy, once considered the gold standard of medical care for the prevention of heart disease, was relegated to the trash bin of history joining medicine's many other fallen heroes including DES, Thalidomide, Vioxx, Avandia and more.

In this new study researchers reviewed the effect of statin prescriptions in a group of 153,840 women without diabetes and with an average age of 63.2 years. About 7 percent of women reported taking statin medication between 1993 and 1996. Today there are many, many more women taking statin medications, thus many more are at risk from harm from statins.

There are many reasons to stay properly hydrated, but only recently have scientists begun to consider diabetes prevention one of them. The amount of water you drink can play a role in how your body regulates blood sugar, researchers have found.

The reason: a hormone called vasopressin, which helps regulate water retention.

When the body is dehydrated, vasopressin levels rise, prompting the kidneys to hold onto water. At the same time, the hormone pushes the liver to produce blood sugar, which over time may strain the ability to produce or respond to insulin.

One of the largest studies to look at the consequences was published last year in Diabetes Care, a publication of the American Diabetes Association.

Ling Zheng, Kun Huang and colleagues explain that previous studies show that coffee drinkers are at a lower risk for developing Type 2 diabetes, which accounts for 90-95 percent of diabetes cases in the world. Those studies show that people who drink four or more cups of coffee daily have a 50 percent lower risk of Type 2 diabetes. And every additional cup of coffee brings another decrease in risk of almost 7 percent. Scientists have implicated the misfolding of a substance called human islet amyloid polypeptide (hIAPP) in causing Type 2 diabetes, and some are seeking ways to block that process. Zheng and Huang decided to see if coffee's beneficial effects might be due to substances that block hIAPP.
 

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Overall, the program would save $29.8 billion in medical costs. But, the program itself would require a $24 billion investment. Still, the researchers said, it would only take about 14 years to recoup the money spent on the program.

"The take-home message is that implementing screening and community-based lifestyle interventions can improve health and reduce health care costs over the long term. This is an efficient use of health care resources," said Xiaohui Zhuo, a health economist in the division of diabetes translation at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention).

Findings from Zhuo's study are published in the January issue of Health Affairs, a thematic issue of the journal looking at diabetes prevention programs.

Almost 26 million Americans have type 2 diabetes, according to the CDC. The exact cause of the disease is unknown, but lifestyle factors such as being overweight or not exercising are strongly associated with the development of type 2 diabetes. People diagnosed with prediabetes can often prevent the development of type 2 diabetes by losing some weight and increasing their physical activity. The American Diabetes Association recommends at least 150 minutes of moderate aerobic activity each week.

According to the new study, everyone in the country between 65 and 84 would receive a letter offering laboratory screening for diabetes. The researchers assumed that younger people would be screened at their physicians' offices.

Zhuo's hypothetical lifestyle program is a community-based intervention based on the "Promoting a Lifestyle of Activity and Nutrition for Working to Alter the Risk of Diabetes" study. The program would include 16 intensive core sessions offered over five months to help people lose weight and to adopt other healthy lifestyle habits. The researchers estimated a weight loss of about nine pounds.

The first sessions would be followed by six monthly sessions to help reinforce and sustain the new lifestyle changes. During the second year, people would be offered eight maintenance sessions.

During the first- and second-year sessions, the training would be offered by trained lifestyle coaches. Next, follow-up sessions would be conducted by a health care provider once or twice a year, according to the study.

Realizing that not everyone would maintain a weight loss or a new exercise regimen, the authors assumed that there would be a 40 percent risk reduction in diabetes for the first two years for people between 18 and 64. They also assumed that after the first two years, there would be a decrease in the risk reduction of about 10 percent per year.

Zhuo and colleagues also assumed that older people might be more likely to sustain healthy changes and figured a 50 percent reduction in diabetes risk for the first two years and a 15 percent decline in risk reduction for each subsequent year in people between 65 and 84 years old.

The cost of this intervention would be about $300 per person for the first year, $150 for the second and about $50 a year thereafter, according to the report. The authors estimated it would take about 14 years to recoup this investment. But, over 25 years, it would save nearly $6 billion in health care costs.

Zhuo said the biggest barrier to implementing such a program would be funding. But, he said, policies offering incentives to private insurers for providing diabetes-prevention reimbursement might help get more insurers to consider making the investment.

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This study was accepted for publication in The Endocrine Society's Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (JCEM).

High rates of vitamin D deficiency have been found in obese populations and past studies have linked low vitamin D levels to cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes. The mechanisms by which obesity and its comorbidities are related to vitamin D deficiency are not fully known. This new study examined associations between vitamin D levels and dietary habits in obese children, and tested whether there were correlations between vitamin D levels and markers of abnormal glucose metabolism and blood pressure.

"Our study found that obese children with lower vitamin D levels had higher degrees of insulin resistance," said Micah Olson, MD, of The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas and lead author of the study. "Although our study cannot prove causation, it does suggest that low vitamin D levels may play a role in the development of type 2 diabetes."

Engineers and doctors across the world have worked for years to find a painless way, and now a new study adds another drop of confidence to the idea of testing tears instead of blood.

A sensor developed by researchers at the University of Michigan detected dilute levels of sugar, or glucose, in tears, according to the study published yesterday (Nov. 9) in the journal Analytical Chemistry.

In a test of 12 rabbits, researchers showed that glucose levels in tears correlated to glucose levels in the blood, upping the competition to find a bloodless test for diabetics.

Clinicians say there is great demand for an alternative to finger-prick tests. The American Diabetes Association estimates 25.8 million people in the United States have diabetes, though of those, 7 million are undiagnosed.

Matthias von Herrath, M.D. one of the world's leading type 1 diabetes experts, and director of the Diabetes Research Center at the La Jolla Institute for Allergy & Immunology, explained:

"We are presenting the first images at cellular resolution of type 1 diabetes as-it-unfolds. Being able to view these insulin-producing cells while they interact in the pancreas, rather than in a static state under the microscope, will greatly enhance our ability – and that of the broader scientific community – to find interventions for type 1 diabetes."

"Here in the U.S. we're now almost three years behind and the first study to test these systems is just going to launch in the next month, which means it's going to be another year or so before patients even have access," said Aaron Kowalski, assistant vice president of treatment therapies for the foundation. "What JDRF is advocating for is to ensure that people here in the U.S. have access to these tools in a timely manner."

The FDA says other countries have different regulatory systems in place that do not require the same safety and effectiveness data for a product of this level of risk.

Tom Brobson, a 51-year-old Christmas tree farmer and the national director for donor relations at JDRF was diagnosed eight years ago with type 1 diabetes. "I think they're getting hung up on better when good enough can do the job. You can't get better until it's out there being used. We know that technology isn't perfect, but what we're talking about are significant improvements and enhancements over what we have today that can significantly reduce the daily burden of living with this disease, improve quality of lives and save lives."