Dementia defence through better diabetes management

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Editing and Researching news and stories about global and local Pharmacy Issues

There has been an emerging body of information that holds that diabetes should be managed in respect of insulin levels, rather than blood sugar levels.
Type 2 diabetes is characterised by high sugar levels and high insulin levels (insulin resistance).
Insulin is a storage hormone and at some stage begins to convert excess sugar to fats that are ultimately stored as central fat.
Insulin also stimulates appetite and that leads to over-eating and the endless cycle involving weight reduction and rebound weight gain, as diabetics strive to manage their condition.
Australian recommendations for diabetes management include exercise, weight loss, cholesterol and blood pressure treatment and reasonable, but not perfect sugar control.
Weight loss is diet related so diabetics have to permanently skew their diet towards a high protein diet with low starchy foods and low sugar intake.
This will reduce blood sugar levels to that able be coped with utilising existing insulin response.
There is also evidence that artificial sweeteners create cravings for sugary foods and that high fructose corn syrup, a widespread sweetener for many packaged foods, triggers off high blood sugar levels and a high insulin response.
Better diabetic control avoiding the use of drugs that trigger "hypos" may be the best defence against dementia.

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Source: DPS Aged Care

http://www.agedcareguide.com.au/news.asp?newsid=4334

Dementia link to aggressive blood sugar control

A recent study followed over 16,000 people with type 2 diabetes to see what happened to those who'd had hypoglycaemias badly enough to need hospital treatment.

They found that one or more severe episodes of hypoglycaemia were associated with a significantly increased risk of developing dementia.

Now it's possible that the reduced memory and thinking ability made these people bad at looking after themselves, but it looked as though the hypos preceded the dementia.

It's also possible the problem relates to the severity of the diabetes causing little strokes but the researchers didn't think so.

This reinforces the recommendations in Australia, which are that if you have type 2 diabetes what you need is exercise, weight loss, cholesterol and blood pressure treatment and reasonable, but not perfect sugar control.