New In Diabetes Drugs: Healthier Hearts, Improved Glucose Management

New in Diabetes Drugs: Healthier Hearts, Improved Glucose Management

New in Diabetes Drugs: Healthier Hearts, Improved Glucose Management
Research presented at ADAs 2017 conference shows exciting advances in a host of diabetes drugs including heart benefits, improved glucose control, lower cholesterol, weight loss, less hypoglycemia, and more
The recent American Diabetes Associations (ADA) 77th Scientific Sessions brought leaders in diabetes research, care, and advocacy to sunny San Diego, CA, for a week filled with learning about the latest in the field of diabetes.
The most noteworthy drug updates from the conference included:
SGLT-2 inhibitors (Jardiance, Farxiga, Invokana): Announced earlier this year, CVD-REAL was a very large real-world study that compared how well SGLT-2 inhibitors work in daily life versus other glucose-lowering drugs like metformin , DPP-4 inhibitors , GLP-1 agonists , and insulin. The results suggested that the entire category (the class) of SGLT-2 inhibitors Jardiance, Farxiga, and Invokana has a positive effect on heart health. This follows positive results from large trials for Jardiance ( EMPA-REG OUTCOME ) and Invokana ( CANVAS ) that also demonstrated a heart benefit. A more rigorous heart outcomes trial for Farxiga is ongoing (DECLARE). The CVD-REAL study did not collect amputation or other safety data, so its not clear if the amputation concerns observed for Invokana might apply to the other drugs in the SGLT-2 inhibitor class too. See a separate diaTribe article on the CANVAS results presented at ADA 2017 here .
Xultophy: The DUAL VII trial compared Xultophy, a combination drug of Tresiba (a basa Continue reading

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Resistance training to improve type 2 diabetes: working toward a prescription for the future

Resistance training to improve type 2 diabetes: working toward a prescription for the future
Nutrition & Metabolism volume14, Articlenumber:24 (2017) Cite this article
The prevalence of type 2 diabetes (T2D) is rapidly increasing, and effective strategies to manage and prevent this disease are urgently needed. Resistance training (RT) promotes health benefits through increased skeletal muscle mass and qualitative adaptations, such as enhanced glucose transport and mitochondrial oxidative capacity. In particular, mitochondrial adaptations triggered by RT provide evidence for this type of exercise as a feasible lifestyle recommendation to combat T2D, a disease typically characterized by altered muscle mitochondrial function. Recently, the synergistic and antagonistic effects of combined training and Metformin use have come into question and warrant more in-depth prospective investigations. In the future, clinical intervention studies should elucidate the mechanisms driving RT-mitigated mitochondrial adaptations in muscle and their link to improvements in glycemic control, cholesterol metabolism and other cardiovascular disease risk factors in individuals with T2D.
The significance of resistance training for individuals with type 2 diabetes: moving beyond what we already know
The prevalence of type 2 diabetes (T2D) continues to increase. Within the next 20years, the number of people affected by this disease is expected to reachalmost 600 million worldwide [ 1 ]. T2D is accompanied by a host of risk factors including dyslipidemia, hypertension and cardiovascular disease [ Continue reading

How Old Are You, Really? Telomeres, Biological Age, and Diabetes

I consider myself healthier than most women my age. I do a variety of physical activity, eat lots of vegetables and a balanced diet, meditate, and strive to limit the amount of time I sit at my desk. When I heard from a friend that I could learn my biological age, which is different from my chronological age, I had to check it out.
Your chronological age is based on your birth date, but your biological age shows how well your body is aging. In the past, I have taken online quizzes to get an idea of my biological age and whether or not the “lifestyle medicine” that I practice and preach is working. Online quizzes such as this are easy to find with a simple Google search, but most likely not as accurate as telomere testing.
Telomeres are sections of DNA found at each end of a chromosome. Humans have 46 chromosomes in most cells of the body. These chromosomes replicate—or copy themselves—when a cell divides, passing the genetic information they carry to the new cells. Telomeres form a cap that protects the ends of the chromosomes during cell reproduction. As described by Dr. John Axe, you can imagine a telomere as acting like the little plastic tip on a shoelace that prevents the shoelace from fraying. Without telomeres, important DNA could be damaged or lost every time a cell divides.
As we age, telomere length shortens. Two main factors contribute to this shortening. The first is sometimes called the “end replication problem,” which describes the shortening of the DNA strands every time a cell carries out replication. This shortening may account for the loss of a Continue reading

Cold and Diabetes - Antifreeze in the Blood?

Cold and Diabetes Antifreeze in the Blood?
Homeostasis. Thermoreceptors, thermogenesis, blood-glucose. A lovely vocabulary of regulation. When its cold, you shiver; when its hot, you sweat, and when youre diabetic, you begin to understand the sheer amount of energy it takes to keep a human body at 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit all the time.
Now that winters here, its time to explore the mysterious relationship between diabetes and cold weather. Most of the people I know who have Type 1, also have strong opinions about what cold does or doesnt do to ones sugars, but the science behind each opinion remains murky for now.
I can tell you, anecdotally if not scientifically, that the feeling of being cold might mask the feeling of being low . Both feel like a subtle cellular panic, and sometimes when Im out in the cold I dont realize how low I am.
One time in college, I went sledding with my friends. In order to reach the best hill, we had to park on one side of a frozen lake and walk across. Wind-kicked snow swirled around us, reducing, in that wonderful meteorological phrase, visibility. It was probably between 10 and 20 degrees Fahrenheit, and Id brought a can of Coca-Cola for sugar.
Being from Georgia, I had no idea what cold, serious cold, could do to ones blood glucose level (BGL). Simply by walking across the lake (an eerie and lovely experience, as strangers on ice skates appeared out of the mist and swept past us), my BGL dove to the 40s mg/dl (2.2 mmol/L). Then I realized Id forgotten my coke in the car. My friend had to hurry back over the lake, drive around, and run Continue reading

Minecraft Teaches Kids Type 1 Diabetes

Editors Note: Want to help fund this incredibly inventive tech project to help kinds learn about Type 1 Diabetes, visit here .
When a child is diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes, not only is he or she faced with learning new complicated self-care, but theyre also tasked with explaining what it means to have the chronic illness to peers and their community. This often proves to be a challenge and when communication fails, a child can feel even more isolated. Imagine though a way in which a child could teach Type 1 to his or her peers that doesnt include clinical explanations but rather a hands on experience, an opportunity to walk in the newly diagnosed childs shoes. More, what if it were a game, a virtual world in which the peer group was already familiar operating.
Meet the man who designed it Brisbane native Joshua Wulf, a software engineer who worked for Red Hat, the worlds first billion-dollar open-source software company. Hes been programming since he was 10 years old; hes also the father to a son who was diagnosed at age 8. He tells Beyond Type 1 that he stumbled into teaching kids code because he wanted to teach his own son, but the kids were restless after school and didnt want to sit through another lesson. I saw that the kids loved Minecraft [a world-building video game] where they learned long codes to be able to do things and got to collaborate and compete with other children. Its like a sand pit with Lego blocks inside a computer, says Wulf. The kids were already motivated to play the game, so I wondered if we could incorporate learning with it, so we found a Continue reading