SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
from the big-pharma-ain't-gonna-like-this dept.
A team from Newcastle University, UK, has shown that Type 2 diabetes is caused by fat accumulating in the pancreas -- and that losing less than one gram of that fat through weight loss reverses the diabetes.
Affecting two and a half million people in the UK -- and on the increase -- Type 2 diabetes is a long-term condition caused by too much glucose, a type of sugar, in the blood.
...
In a trial, 18 people with Type 2 diabetes and 9 people who did not have diabetes were measured for weight, fat levels in the pancreas and insulin response before and after bariatric surgery. The patients with Type 2 diabetes had been diagnosed for an average of 6.9 years, and all for less than 15 years.The people with Type 2 diabetes were found to have increased levels of fat in the pancreas.
The participants in the study had all been selected to have gastric bypass surgery for obesity and were measured before the operation then again eight weeks later. After the operation, those with Type 2 diabetes were immediately taken off their medication.
Both groups lost the same amount of weight, around 13% of their initial body weight. Critically, the pool of fat in the pancreas did not change in the non-diabetics but decreased to a normal level in those with Type 2 diabetes.
Good news for people with Type 2 diabetes and puts more importance on sticking to New Year's resolutions to lose weight.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by ikanreed on Friday December 04 2015, @03:19PM
I read a medical paper about 6 months ago(it's really hard to find again, sorry) that examined long term trends in metabolic disorders(i.e. diabetes) in Austrian adults(I think N was 1000ish) over 5 years, grouping by starting and ending BMI ranges. The exact numbers are seared into my head because the study had a profound impact on my lifestyle.
Those going from an Obese BMI to an Overweight BMI over the 5 years had a 54% lower incidence rate of metabolic disorders at the end than those remaining in the obese range. Those going from an overweight BMI to a normal BMI had a 96% lower incidence rate than their peers who remained overweight. Ninety-fucking-six percent. None of the participants going from obese to healthy weight developed a metabolic disorder, but that was a small enough population that a statistical inference could not be drawn.
Increasing weights over the course of the study were implicated in increased incidence. Now, I'm aware of the whole correlation!=causation thing, but those are some serious numbers.