Treatment • Lifestyle Tips • Diabetes Prevention
The American Diabetes Association recommends that testing to detect pre-diabetes and type 2 diabetes be considered in adults without symptoms who are overweight or obese and have one or more additional risk factors for diabetes. In those without these risk factors, testing should begin at age 45. Risk factors for pre-diabetes and diabetes—in addition to being overweight or obese or being age 45 or older—include the following…
Amy Tenderich, a well respected blogger about diabetes wrote an article worth reading, “10 Reasons Why the Actos Pre-Diabetes study is Dumb.”. I want to point out that the Actos study is not an isolated “dumb” study. Her article also prompted me to want to point out something that really needs to be said: Pre-diabetes and type 2 diabetes are NOT a “fat people” disease…
There are many health disorders than can be associated with pre-diabetes. If you have polycystic ovarian syndrome, thyroid disease, or a family history of type 2 diabetes, you should consider being tested for pre-diabetes. If you experience unexplained rapid weight gain, you should ask your doctor about insulin resistance and pre-diabetes. Use our list as a guideline to determine if you should be tested for pre-diabetes!
Pre-diabetes is diagnosed when blood sugars are mildly elevated but not high enough to classify a person as being diabetic. But insulin resistance can still be present even when blood sugars are still normal. People with untreated insulin resistance are at significant risk for pre-diabetes and type 2 diabetes. Lab tests that only check blood glucose levels are not sufficient to rule out insulin resistance. It is possible to have normal blood glucose levels but abnormally high insulin levels (insulin resistance).
Waist-to-hip (sometimes mistakenly referred to as hip-to-waist) ratio is a comparison between your waist and your hip measurements. It does not tell you if you have pre-diabetes but can be useful in determining risk factors. According to research scientists at the Imperial College Long, the German Institute of Human Nutrition, and other contributors across Europe in the “EPIC” study “…every 5 cm [2 inches] of increase in waist size increases the risk of death by 17%.”
I am thin — do I have to be fat to have prediabetes or insulin resistance? Weight plays an important role as a risk factor for pre-diabetes but you do not have to be overweight to have it. Learn who should be test for pre-diabetes regardless of their weight…
