Why People With Diabetes Should Avoid Meal Skipping

The diet industry earns about $65 million per year by helping people lose weight. If you are a constant "dieter" and are still not getting the results you need, you might be lured into trying the next step. Why not skip meals to shed pounds? You'd save money and lose weight, right? Skipping meals is definitely not the answer. In fact, skipping meals is one of the worst things you can do, especially if you have diabetes.
It's one thing to skip a meal because you are busy or something came up unexpectedly, but you should not skip meals intentionally.
The Negative Effects of Skipping Meals
If you are someone with diabetes, it is important to eat regular, balanced meals to help stabilize your blood sugars. If you take an oral diabetes medicine that tells your pancreas to make insulin or actual insulin and you delay or skip a meal, your blood sugar can drop. Hypoglycemia (low blood sugar)—defined as anything less than 70mg/dL—must be treated with 15g of fast-acting carbohydrate to bring blood sugars to a safe level. Low blood sugars result in taking in extra calories from sugar to pick them up. For someone who is trying to lose weight, this doesn't make sense because not only are you taking in extra calories, but you are probably feeling pretty crummy too. Frequent bouts of low blood sugar are not only dangerous but can cause weight gain.
Skipping a meal doesn't mean you can eat more later, either. For example, if you skip lunch, you shouldn't go overboard with the carbohydrates at dinner to make up for it. When you ingest a large meal, rich in carbohydrates, the body must p Continue reading

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Signs & Treatments for Hypoglycemia in Diabetic Pets

Sometimes it’s good to go back to basic diabetes topics. Many of our readers are very educated in diabetic pet care, but I need to remind myself that we get new readers all the time. One of the greater concerns of treating diabetes, as we aim to achieve the proper insulin dosage, is hypoglycemia. If we accidentally expose the pet to too much insulin because a pet doesn’t eat as much as usual, or perhaps even vomits, then we could end up with a low blood glucose. Or, if we start at too high of an insulin dosage we could cause the blood glucose to go too low. I like to “sneak up” on the insulin dosage when we start a pet on insulin for this very reason. It’s good for pet owners to know how hypoglycemia might look and what to do in this event.
Before we talk about what is low blood glucose, let’s first discuss what a normal blood glucose level is.
The normal range for blood glucose in dogs and cats depends on several things. If the pet is at home, where white coat syndrome doesn’t play a role, a pet’s blood glucose is usually around 100 mg/dl, give or take a 30 points or so, for NON-diabetic pets. I think reference labs take stress hyperglycemia, anxiety while at the vet clinic, into account when they make their “normal range” for dogs and cats. One of the largest reference laboratories in veterinary medicine in America is Antech Labs. For dogs, the reference range for blood glucose at Antech is 70 to 138. For cats the normal reference range for blood glucose at Antech is 64 to 170. Cats are a bit more prone to stress hyperglycemia than dogs but it can happ Continue reading

Diabetes and heart disease linked by genes, study reveals

Type 2 diabetes (T2D) has become a global epidemic affecting more than 380 million people worldwide; yet there are knowledge gaps in understanding the etiology of type-2 diabetes. T2D is also a significant risk factor for coronary heart disease (CHD), but the biological pathways that explain the connection have remained somewhat murky. Now, in a large analysis of genetic data, published on August 28, 2017 in Nature Genetics, a team, led by researchers in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, has first looked into what causes T2D and second clarified how T2D and CHD - the two diseases that are the leading cause of global morbidity and mortality, are linked.
Examining genome sequence information for more than 250,000 people, the researchers first uncovered 16 new diabetes genetic risk factors, and one new CHD genetic risk factor; hence providing novel insights about the mechanisms of the two diseases. They then showed that most of the sites on the genome known to be associated with higher diabetes risk are also associated with higher CHD risk. For eight of these sites, the researchers were able to identify a specific gene variant that influences risk for both diseases. The shared genetic risk factors affect biological pathways including immunity, cell proliferation, and heart development.
The findings add to the basic scientific understanding of both these major diseases and point to potential targets for future drugs.
"Identifying these gene variants linked to both type 2 diabetes and CHD risk in principle opens up opportunities to lower the risk Continue reading

7 New Ways to Make Sweet Potatoes Part of Your Diabetes Diet

Sweet potatoes are one of the most popular foods for diabetes on EverdayHealth.com, and with good reason.
The root vegetable is higher in fiber than its regular-potato cousin. Fiber cannot be digested by the human body, so it provides bulk without adding calories and helps keep you fuller for longer. “Sweet potatoes have many health benefits,” notes Sylvia White, RD, CDE, a dietitian in private practice in Memphis, Tennessee. “They are anti-inflammatory and have antioxidants that help prevent diseases. This includes heart disease, the number one cause of death in people with diabetes.”
Sweet potatoes are also an excellent source of vitamin A. “This vitamin may help improve the function of our pancreatic beta cells,” says Lori Zanini, RD, CDE, the creator of the online training program For the Love of Diabetes, based in Manhattan Beach, California. This is significant because beta cells produce, store, and release insulin, according to the British diabetes association Diabetes.co.uk.
When it comes to preparing sweet potatoes, you may want to opt for boiled when you can, suggests a small study published in September 2011 in the Journal of Nutrition and Metabolism. In the study, volunteers ate sweet potatoes that were roasted, baked, fried, or boiled. Boiled sweet potatoes have the lowest glycemic index value, meaning they won’t quickly spike your blood sugar. Baked and roasted sweet potatoes have the highest glycemic index values.
7 Tips and Tricks for Preparing Sweet Potatoes if You Have Diabetes
If you have diabetes, you can eat sweet potatoes daily — as lon Continue reading

How service dogs help Canadians living with diabetes

Trained noses help diabetes service dogs sniff out their owners’ low blood sugar – and even save their lives. That’s dogged determination.
Ukita is a 2-year-old yellow Labrador retriever who loves hitting the golf course with her owner, Cory Carter, an electrician from Langley, B.C. Off the golf course, she follows Carter from site to site, joyfully wagging her tail and occasionally carrying his tool belt. While Carter is hard at work wiring homes, Ukita works too, vigilantly smelling Carter’s breath to detect if his blood sugar suddenly drops.
“I look at [having a diabetes alert dog] as another tool in the fight against diabetes, especially if you’re at your last straw,” says Carter.
Carter, 28, has had type 1 diabetes since he was 10. When his blood sugar drops, he experiences hypoglycemia, a dangerous condition that can cause convulsions or even a coma. Most people notice when their blood sugar drops: Their hands tremble, they feel dizzy and they may even break into a cold sweat. But some people with diabetes, like Carter, are hypoglycemic-unaware. They don’t show the typical signs of hypoglycemia, so they need to be extra-vigilant about monitoring their blood-sugar levels.
Learn more about the difference between type 1 and type 2 diabetes
Carter has used a series of tools to treat his diabetes since his diagnosis, but in recent years, he felt he needed more help. So last January, Carter and his wife flew from Langley to Oakville, Ontario to meet Ukita, one of the Lions Foundation of Canada’s diabetes alert dogs.
Training a diabetes service dog
Since 20 Continue reading