Lifestyle Counseling Therapy
Lifestyle modifications play an important role in both the prevention and management of diabetes. Although it was once believed that diabetes was primarily a genetic disease, it is now known that genetic factors alone account for as little as 5% to 10% of Type I cases. This means that dietary and environmental factors play a crucial role in its development. The single strongest predictor of Type II diabetes is being overweight. Even when genes increase susceptibility to diabetes, physical exercise and dietary modifications have proven effective in delaying or preventing entirely the manifestation of the disease.
Knowing that diabetes is largely preventable, altering your lifestyle to include more healthful habits that promote stable blood sugar is critically important. If you have already been diagnosed with diabetes, naturopathic health management techniques may prevent complications, reduce or eliminate the need for prescription drugs, and enable you to better control your blood sugar.
This may not be easy. Modifying your lifestyle to meet these requirements can be an enormous undertaking. It may take a lot of commitment and time to achieve your goals, so commend yourself for the work you are doing each step of the way. Even making small incremental changes will offer long-term health benefits and should not be underestimated.
Clinical Trials: Diabetes Prevention Program
Diabetes Prevention Program
In the Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP), a major clinical trial of 3,234 people already suffering with impaired glucose tolerance, weight loss and a more active lifestyle reduced diabetes onset by 58% overall. This study first showed that exercise and diet can effectively delay diabetes in a diverse American population (45% were from minority groups that suffer disproportionately from Type II diabetes) of overweight people. In fact, the results were so impressive and clear that, on the advice of the DPP’s external data monitoring board, the trial ended a year early so that all participants could have the chance to get benefit from knowing the trial results.
Lifestyle intervention worked as well in men as in women and in all the ethnic groups tested (including African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, and American Indians). Remarkably, it also worked well in people age 60 and older, who have a nearly 20% prevalence of diabetes. Their risk was reduced by 71%. A number of other clinical trials involving lifestyle changes have shown that this type of intervention can delay or prevent type II diabetes in these high risk group populations.
Pima Indians
Originally based in rural Mexico, the Pima Indians have been extensively studied for their high propensity to develop Type II diabetes. Diabetes was largely unknown to this population prior to their emigration northward into the United States. Their diet relied on hunting and gathering techniques, and they successfully farmed fruits and vegetables. Following their migration, reduced physical activity and a diet high in processed foods caused the number of diabetes cases within their population to explode.
Researchers have hypothesized that this has occurred because their genes are ‘thrifty’. This means that the Pima are genetically programmed to maximize their energy storage from available calories. As their diet changed, becoming much higher in fat, refined carbohydrates, and overall calories, their systems continued to maximize intake, storing large excesses as fat. This elevated their blood sugar levels and ultimately led to the development of diabetes. Intervention programs that altered their diet and lifestyle to reflect their tradition dramatically improved blood sugar levels. The impact of a North American diet on the Pima Indians has also been measured directly against populations remaining in Mexico but sharing similar genes. This research has offered convincing results that lifestyle factors are largely responsible for the development of Type II diabetes.
Nurses’ Study
Several recent studies have echoed these conclusions. Almost 85,000 nurses were followed by researchers for 16 years. The low-risk group was identified by such factors as cereal fiber intake, body mass index, and level of physical activity. By documenting 3,300 new cases of diabetes over the course of the study, being overweight or obese was identified as the single most important predictor of diabetes, while lack of exercise, poor diet, and smoking were among factors associated with a significantly increased risk.
International Studies: In Finland, dietary and exercise intervention over the course of 1 year on NIDDM subjects led to better metabolic control and a reduced need for oral anti-diabetic drugs. Another study in China of 110,660 subjects focused on preventing diabetes in patients with identified impaired glucose tolerance. Over a period of 6 years, the researchers found that diet and lifestyle interventions significantly decreased the incidence of diabetes, and these results were echoed in a much smaller study of 52 New Zealand subjects that made similar conclusions.
Lifestyle Factors Contributing to Insulin Resistance and Diabetes
1. Dietary excesses and deficiencies
- High in carbohydrates
- Very high in saturated fats and trans fats
- High in refined sugars and starches
- High in high glycemic foods
- Low in protein
- Very low in essential fatty acids
- Inadequate in fiber
- Inadequate in vegetables
- Deficient in micronutrients (such as chromium)
- Salt intake that is either too low or too high
2. Lack of physical activity
3. Stress
4. Smoking (nicotine consumption)
