Can You Reverse Type 2 Diabetes?
The short answer is Yes! I did it! Many others that had followed my protocols also reverse it!! Following is an article that supports how a healthy diet and lifestyle prevent and even reverses its progress.
by Monique Tello, MD, MPH Practicing physician at Massachusetts General Hospital, Clinical Instructor at Harvard Medical School.
The rate of type 2 diabetes is increasing around the world. Type 2 diabetes is a major cause of vision loss and blindness, kidney failure requiring dialysis, heart attacks, strokes, amputations, infections, and even early death. Over 80% of people with prediabetes (that is, high blood sugars with the high risk for developing full-blown diabetes) don’t know it. One in four people who have full-blown diabetes doesn’t know they have it! Research suggests that a healthy lifestyle can prevent diabetes from occurring in the first place and even reverse its progress.
Can a healthy diet and lifestyle prevent diabetes?
The Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP), a large, long-term study, asked the question: we know an unhealthy diet and lifestyle can cause type 2 diabetes, but can adopting a healthy diet and lifestyle prevent it? This answer is yes: the vast majority of prediabetes and type 2 diabetes can be prevented through diet and lifestyle changes, and this has been proven by 20 years of medical research.
Researchers from the DPP took people at risk for type 2 diabetes and gave them a 24-week diet and lifestyle intervention, a medication (metformin), or placebo (a fake pill), to see if anything could lower their risk for developing diabetes. The very comprehensive diet and lifestyle intervention had the goal of changing participants’ daily habits, and included: 16 classes teaching basic nutrition and behavioral strategies for weight loss and physical activity; lifestyle coaches with frequent contact with participants; supervised physical activity sessions; and good clinical support for reinforcing an individualized plan.
Perhaps not surprisingly, the diet and lifestyle intervention was incredibly effective. After three years, the diet and lifestyle group had a 58% lower risk of developing diabetes than the placebo group. Participants aged 60 and older had an even better response, with a whopping 71% lower risk of developing diabetes. The diet and lifestyle effect lasted: even after 10 years, those folks had a 34% lower risk of developing diabetes compared to placebo. Men, women, and all racial and ethnic groups had similar results (and almost half of participants represented racial and ethnic minorities). These results are not surprising to me or to other doctors, because we have all seen patients with prediabetes or diabetes get their sugars down with diet, exercise, and weight loss alone.
