The normal blood sugar level is below 100 deciliters and it is called normoglycemia while a blood sugar level over 125 deciliters is considered diabetic. Prediabetes is a condition in which a person is considered at borderline and it ranges from 100 to 125 deciliter. People can develop diabetes and can return back to their normal sugar level depending upon their choice of lifestyle, exercise, and food.
Research has been conducted by a group of researchers from the Aging Research Center at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden. This study was led by Ying Shang, a Ph.D. student who along with her colleagues studied 918 participants. All of them were over 60 years old and had been diagnosed with prediabetes. This research has been conducted for 12 years and the results indicated that 13% of the participating individuals are later diagnosed with diabetes during the study period. Another prominent result of this research is that 22% of the participants progressed back to normal blood sugar levels.
This is a remarkable study that reveals that every individual suffering from prediabetes will not suffer diabetes and its health can be improved by returning back to normal blood sugar level. The researcher told that during this 12-year study, most of the people either remained at the stable prediabetic state or regained good health by returning to normoglycemia while only one-third of the participants developed diabetes or died.
This study also indicated that co-morbidities are one of the most significant contributing factors that transform a person’s prediabetic state to diabetic within a few years. Such co-morbidities include low systolic blood pressure, no heart disease and healthy body weight that lies in the BMI’ normal range. The researchers also influenced suggesting preventive measures as well as strategies that help a prediabetic person to achieve normal blood sugar level by some lifestyle and diet modification. The most important thing to must include in daily life is a physical exercise which helps in lowering the mortality rate in people suffering from prediabetes.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there are over 1 billion people in the United States who are suffering from prediabetes and diabetes. Among them, over 90% of people with prediabetes are unaware of their underlying condition. Prediabetes is a condition that usually occurs at a very young age and people will adjust according to it without being aware of it and it remained silently in the body due to infrequent blood glucose screening in the country.
The symptoms that occur during prediabetes states are almost the same as that occurs in the state of diabetes. It includes excessive thirst and hunger, fatigue, dry mouth, weight loss, frequent urination, etc. The most common test that checks and confirm prediabetes, as well as diabetes, requires fasting of 8 to 12 hours which is then followed by a withdrawing a blood sample to measure the amount of glucose in the blood. Another most common way to check the blood glucose level is done by HbA1c. This test does not require fasting and it tracks by measuring the blood glucose level of the past 3 months. Hemoglobin A1c binds to the glucose within the blood so it is helpful in obtaining a record of 3 months to give a more clear picture of a person’s condition.
When anyone is diagnosed with prediabetes, certain strategies will be made and then some patients are counseled so that they will adopt some healthy lifestyles to avoid disease progression into diabetes. All prediabetic patients are advised to maintain a healthy diet with some physical exercises. Losing excess weight is also essential when it comes to maintaining great health in the state of prediabetes. They are also advised to stop taking sugar and sugar-containing products.
There are a number of preventive measures and steps that must be taken into consideration when you are trying to reverse prediabetes as well as its progression into diabetes. Some major steps have been instructed by Jocelyn Nadua who is a registered practical nurse and care coordinator at C-Care Health Services. This is a Toronto-based agency providing home healthcare and nursing services. A Pharmacist, as well as a nutritionist Erin Pitkethly with the Robinsong Health Low Carb Clinic, also gave her idea in support of prevention. The collective significant steps by Nadua and Pitkethly are as follows:
- Avoid sugar or limit sugar intake as much as possible to keep the balance inside the body as people with prediabetes are already having a higher amount of blood sugar levels and at high risk.
- When it comes to choosing the right food, always go for the ones that have a lower glycemic index (GI = less than or equal 55)
- Lower intake of foods that contain carbohydrates is highly essential because the simplest unit of all carbohydrates is glucose.
- Foods such as bread, rice, pasta should be avoided and their intake must be reduced to lower the blood sugar level.
- Prediabetes can be reversed by to a healthy state by simply adopting a Mediterranean diet because some people are able to reverse their condition by simple cutting the intake of high carbs processed foods such as soda cans, cookies, potato chips, candies, etc.
Some people having prediabetes can easily maintain their health by simply avoiding extra sugar or high carbohydrates food. While there are a great many people who find it quite difficult to cope up with this condition and lead a healthy life. They need to follow a strict starch free diet by not taking rice, pasta, bread, potatoes, sugar-containing foods, and drinks, etc. Some people will also face great difficulty in losing those extra pounds that can risk their health at any stage sooner or later.
The reversal of prediabetes is not a cure as this condition can later progress into diabetes without showing any alarming sign. Therefore it is mandatory for anyone suffering from prediabetes to maintain their health by cutting those extra carbs, excess body weight and strictly following a healthy diet which is high in fiber content.