Bret Michaels On Diabetes And Parenting

Bret Michaels on Diabetes and Parenting

Michaels, rocker and spokesperson for the American Diabetes Association talks to Parents.com about raising a daughter with borderline diabetes and diabetes awareness.
The American Diabetes Association named Bret Michaels, a type 1 diabetic, its spokesperson after he won the charity $250,000 on The Celebrity Apprentice, a reality television show. Michaels, best known as the lead singer of 80s hair band Poison and his reality television shows, has two daughters, Raine, 10, and Jorja, 5, with girlfriend Kristi Lynn Gibson. The Michaels family had medical setbacks this past spring when Bret suffered a massive brain hemorrhage and Raine was diagnosed with prediabetes or borderline diabetes.
Michaels raises awareness for his cause in many ways, including a diabetes walk, his reality TV show Life As I Know It on VH1, and visits to hospitals and camps to talk to kids with diabetes and their parents. He's raised nearly $400,000 for the cause.
Parents: What was it like as a child growing up with diabetes?
Bret Michaels: No doubt when I got diagnosed at 6 I was really, really sick. I was going into ketoacidosis and it was a pretty scary time of my life, but I was so young so even when I was in the hospital I was totally having fun.
My parents were fantastic at that time in my life. They both learned how to give me injections and I learned to give myself shots. It's the first time in my life I've ever seen my dad actually cry--where he lost it and walked out of the room and came back composed. It was one of those times in my life where my parents taught me OK doesn't work--we're gonna Continue reading

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New Therapies for Patients With Type 2 Diabetes

Diabetes mellitus is a growing health problem in the United States. According to a recent CDC report, as of 2015, 30.3 million Americans (9.4% of the US population) have diabetes. Of these, 90% to 95% are diagnosed with type 2 diabetes (T2D). This number will likely continue to grow, because an estimated 84.1 million Americans have pre-diabetes, putting them at increased risk of T2D development.1 The manufacturers of the novel combination therapies that enter the market each year hope to simplify medication regimens for patients with T2D and to improve their adherence. Select combination products that were approved in the last few years for T2D are listed in Table 1.2-9
Many patients with T2D will require insulin therapy; however, these patients are also likely to develop insulin resistance over time. Due to insulin resistance and decreased endogenous insulin secretion, patients may require higher insulin doses and an increased number of insulin injections.10 As the needed insulin dosage increases, so, typically, does the volume of injected insulin. Because larger volumes of insulin can lead to painful injections and unpredictable insulin absorption,10 concentrated insulins have become more prominent in clinical practice. Several different insulin formulations have become available in the last few years. Two new insulin/glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonist (GLP-1 RA) combination products have also recently entered the market.
INSULIN
Four different concentrated insulins are currently indicated for patients with T2D. These concentrated insulins are available in the pen f Continue reading

Can Turmeric Help Manage or Prevent Diabetes?

Diabetes is a common condition related to disruptions in your blood sugar level. Your blood sugar level plays an important role in how your body metabolizes food and how it uses energy. Diabetes occurs when your body can’t properly produce or use insulin to regulate blood sugar levels. It affects nearly 13 percent of people ages 20 and older.
Turmeric is a plant that comes from ginger root. Over the years, turmeric has been recognized for its medicinal properties. It’s believed to have a wide range of health benefits, including pain relief and possible disease prevention.
For example, curcumin, the active component in turmeric, may help prevent type 2 diabetes.
Turmeric is a spice often found in Asian food and curries. It helps give the food its yellowish color. For centuries, it has been used in Eastern medicine for general health. It’s often used for improving liver and digestion functions, as well as for easing pain from conditions such as arthritis.
The spice has a large following among alternative medicine users and is gaining popularity in mainstream medicine. Recently, it has received a lot of attention for its potential use in preventing cancer and other diseases. Turmeric is believed to have antioxidant properties that could help fight infection and inflammation.
Research has also suggested that taking turmeric could treat and prevent diabetes.
Turmeric’s active component, curcumin, is credited with many of the spice’s purported benefits.
A 2013 review of studies suggests that curcumin can decrease the level of glucose in blood, as well as other diabetes- Continue reading

Turmeric Extract a ‘Miracle Solution’ in Preventing and Treating Diabetes

In addition to regular exercise and a diet low in processed carbohydrates and sugars, a study indicates turmeric extract could help ward off the development of diabetes, with significant effectiveness.
The study comes to us from researchers in Thailand, who wanted to assess the effectiveness of curcumin, the active component within turmeric, in delaying diabetes in people with prediabetes. What they found was nothing short of amazing:
“After 9 months of treatment, 16.4% of the placebo group were diagnosed with T2DM (type 2 diabetes mellitus), whereas none were diagnosed with T2DM in the curcumin-treated group.”
The study included 240 participants, assigned to either receive a placebo or a supplement of 250 mg of turmeric extract every day for 9 months. It was a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study and all subjects met the American Diabetic Association’s criteria for prediabetes at the onset of the study.
The researchers concluded:
“A 9-month curcumin intervention in a prediabetic population significantly lowered the number of prediabetic individuals who eventually developed T2DM. In addition, the curcumin treatment appeared to improve overall function of β-cells, with very minor adverse effects. Therefore, this study demonstrated that the curcumin intervention in a prediabetic population may be beneficial.”
The findings were published in Diabetes Care, the journal of the American Diabetes Association, a very reputable and “mainstream” medical journal.
Read: 4 Herbs for Diabetes
Such a promising study is clear evidence of the healing powers and b Continue reading

Diabetes: Effective relief for nerve pain steps closer

Drugs that block a protein called HCN2 may have the potential to provide much-needed relief for people with diabetes who have chronic nerve pain.
So concludes a study by researchers from King's College London in the United Kingdom, who report their work in the journal Science Translational Medicine.
Diabetes is a long-lasting disease that arises when the body either cannot use or does not make enough insulin, which is a hormone that helps cells to turn blood sugar into energy.
The global burden of diabetes is rising. In 1980, around 4.7 percent of adults (108 million people) had diabetes. By 2014, this proportion had risen to 8.5 percent (422 million).
Many people with the condition experience diabetic nerve pain - that is, a chronic disorder that results from diabetic neuropathy, which is a type of nerve damage caused by high blood sugar.
Diabetic nerve pain is a complex condition with several symptoms that can include sharp shooting pains, tingling and prickling sensations, and extreme sensitivity to touch. The symptoms often start in the hands and feet before spreading up into the arms and legs.
The pain can be so bad that it impairs mobility, causing people to gain weight, which worsens the effects of diabetes and so sets up a vicious cycle.
Urgent need for effective treatments
"As many as 1 in 4 diabetics suffer from nerve pain," comments senior author Peter McNaughton, a professor in the Wolfson Centre for Age-Related Diseases at King's College London. "Yet there are currently no effective treatments and people therefore typically must resign themselves to a life of c Continue reading