The risk of diabetic complications doesn’t begin with a blood sugar of 126 and it does not go away when the glucose in a patient with diabetes falls below that number. Of course a lower sugar level is better and there are benefits, but make no mistake, the danger of being diabetic does not go away when the glucose returns to “normal”. Patients with prediabetes (fasting sugar of 100-125) have an increased risk of these cardiovascular complications. That increased risk extends even down into the normal sugar range. Patients with a fasting blood sugar of 100 have an increased risk of these complications related to abnormal large and small vessels.
There is another massive anomaly that is inconsistent with the old understanding of diabetes as a high blood sugar. Sixty years ago, most people were slender and type 2 diabetes was rare. Obesity, insulin resistance, and diabetes are epidemic today which cannot be explained by the old environmental and genetic models. There is an entirely new understanding of the origin of these metabolic diseases. The human body adapts to environmental change by switching normal genes on or off. This process of gene regulation is called epigenetics and if overeating fast food and too much abdominal fat switches on a gene, that change persists even after weight loss.
In fact, changes in gene regulation can persist throughout life and even be inherited for at least two generations. A study of harvests and abundant food in Sweden showed that the diet of parents and grandparents prior to having children can increase deaths due to heart disease and diabetes. Too much or too little food during pregnancy and infancy makes diabetes and heart attack more likely. Changes in gene regulation can be inherited and persist for generations. That is one of the main flaws in the idea of diabetes "reversal”. Even though the sugar levels fall into the normal range, the epigenetic changes persist. That is why continuing medications that block the effects of epigenetic changes are so critical. These include medications like losartan, lisinopril, spironolactone, or eplerenone for high blood pressure, metformin or empagliflozin for type 2 diabetes, and statins for high cholesterol.
Smoking cigarettes persistently switches on genes that contribute to insulin resistance and diabetic complications via the same molecular biology. When these principles are applied with best practice diet and expercise, the latest scientific evidence proves that the risk of heart attack, stroke, and kidney failure is dramatically lower. The new science can help you live a longer, healthier life.
We can detect the early cardiovascular effects of pre diabetes BEFORE anyone suspects that it is happening. With 80+% Adults have insulin resistance or some type of metabolic dysfunctions, early detection combined with primary lifestyle optimization measures plus optimal medical therapy, we can reverse this deadly trend. 💯 %!