INDIA — Sawai Man Singh Hospital doctors have given a ray of hope to diabetes patients as they claimed that chances of reversal of diabetes are quite high.
They claimed that type-2 diabetes can be reduced in a certain group of patients.
Over the past one year, doctors at the medicine department have reversed diabetes of patients who were obese and had high cholesterol levels.
“We have reversed diabetes in 46 patients. It is a good sign for patients who have diabetes. It requires a lot of dedication and determination of the patient to reverse diabetes,” said Dr. Prakash Keswani, Senior Professor of Medicine at SMS Hospital.
The SMS Hospital has found that patients who have recently developed type-2 diabetes in the past 2 years have a high chance of reversing diabetes and they will not require to take medicine.
According to studies, diabetes remission is defined as having an HbA1c of less than 6.5% (i.e., at the pre-diabetes stage) without the use of medicines and insulin for at least six months. This concept of reversing diabetes is a novel one.
Diabetes is a major health concern in India with one in every 11 people being a confirmed case of the disease. Moreover, millions are undiagnosed.
Type 2 diabetes is caused by the body’s inability to use insulin properly, often called insulin resistance. It is often associated with an unhealthy lifestyle. Lifestyle changes can help manage and reverse type 2 diabetes.
Inactivity, smoking, and obesity are thought to be responsible for the vast majority of type 2 cases (which account for 90 to 95 percent of all diabetes cases).
The most compelling evidence suggests that weight loss is primarily responsible for putting type 2 diabetes into remission.
Losing weight as soon as possible after being diagnosed with diabetes, your chances of remission increase.
Chances of its reversal are very high if a person loses weight– around 15 Kg–quickly and safely after diagnosis.
While there is no guarantee that weight loss will certainly lead to remission, there is research that shows that even losing 5% of your body weight can lead to fewer medications, better blood sugar levels, and a lower risk of complications.
According to a UK-based diabetes charity study, it is possible for some people to put their Type 2 diabetes into remission using a low-calorie, diet-based, weight management program under the supervision of their general practitioner (GP).
According to the study, losing weight also resulted in a reported better quality of life, improved blood glucose (sugar) control, and a reduced need for diabetes medications.
The study found that some people were able to put their diabetes into remission even 25 years after being diagnosed.
Diabetes is much easier to “reverse” when it is first diagnosed, or even earlier at the prediabetes stage — a person with prediabetes has higher blood sugar levels than normal but not as high as someone with diabetes.
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