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Chemical That Affects Biological Clock Offers New Diabetes Treatment

Posted by samzenpus on from the better-healing dept.

First time accepted submitter rosy rohangi writes "Biologists at UC San Diego have discovered a chemical that provides a completely new direction and promise for the development of drugs to treat metabolic disorders such as type 2 diabetes – a key concern of public health in the U.S. due to the current obesity epidemic. From the article: '...Scientists have long suspected that diabetes and obesity could be related to problems of the biological clock. Laboratory mice with altered biological clocks, for example, often become obese and develop diabetes. Two years ago, a team led by Steve Kay, dean of the Division of Biological Sciences at UC San Diego, discovered the first biochemical link between the biological clock and diabetes. He found that a key protein, cryptochrome, which regulates the biological clocks of plants, insects and mammals also regulates glucose production in the liver and that changes in levels of this protein could improve the health of diabetic mice.'"

107 of 156 comments (clear)

  1. Treatmen woo! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    I like the mans. How does I get some treatmen?

    1. Re:Treatmen woo! by masternerdguy · · Score: 2, Informative

      Actually well managed diabetics can live completely healthy, long, and productive lives. My dad's one of them.

      --
      To offset political mods, replace Flamebait with Insightful.
    2. Re:Treatmen woo! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      Wrong. Don't eat too much HIGHLY CONCENTRATED SHORT CARBOHYDRATES.
      You can eat as much vegetables as you want. You can stuff yourself until you burst every day. You won't get fat and you won't get sick.

      A balanced, species-appropriate diet with no defective (half-heated) proteins... is that so hard?

      Also, YES there is a treatment. You just don't know it yet. (You are aware that you're not “God”, right? [With doctors, you always have to ask.])

    3. Re:Treatmen woo! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Actually well managed diabetics can live completely healthy, long, and productive lives. My dad's one of them.

      Actually, assuming this is true, which is absurd, if people who become diabetic secondary to body-composition management problems, (overeating) could manage themselves well, they WOULDN'T be diabetics, genius.

      Glad your dad is "well managed". However, if you've ever seen a clinic waiting room (or casino gambling floor or a buffet,) full of a bunch of non-managed, super-morbidly obese human slugs missing various fingers, toes, feet, etc., being blinded by their blood turning into maple syrup, you'd know your dad is in the minority.

      People who have this problem are victims of their biology. When food is scarce, (as it has been nearly the world over, for the vast majority of human history,) there is no survival advantage to be had in being able to resist the impulse to satisfy desires for a full stomach, and savory or sweet flavors on the tongue. In fact, quite the contrary, since food, ANY food, in some times and places, was a seasonal thing. You couldn't necessarily get all the nutrition and calories you needed during the winter, so the ability to build up a fat-reserve was a GOOD thing.

      Now of course, because of the plentiful supply, (generally in industrialized nations,) of ridiculously high calorie foods, those people whose genetics code for a body that doesn't naturally build up a fat-reserve when food is plentiful, which was a lethal DISADVANTAGE for most of human history, turns into a survival advantage because it tends to reduce the odds of developing obesity comorbidities, such as insulin resistance/diabetes mellitus. So I welcome this development of a new treatment, as anyone should, just as I'm glad for such things as the discovery of aspirin, penicillin, and the invention of corrective lenses.

      Evolution has, however, relatively little say in this, since these conditions tend not to kill before the victim is generally capable of reproducing successfully, and managing to raise the offspring to sufficient maturity that the offspring can manage without the parent(s).

      If human beings entered their reproductive years, male and female both, AFTER diseases such as diabetes mellitus would cull those who can't resist temptation to overeat, you would see VERY few fat people. If women, even down to the point when they become fertile, refused to have sex with men until they reached their 40's and 50's, to verify their general health and virility into middle age, we would regain much of what we lost, in terms of an evolutionary curb on excessive eating, from the fact that these diseases kill only after, usually, it's too late to matter from a species-survival perspective.

      Well, guess we'll see how it turns out.

      Isn't irony delicious?

    4. Re:Treatmen woo! by mug+funky · · Score: 1, Interesting

      or we could just eat less.

      give it 10 years or so... perhaps scarcity will become the norm again.

      and with childhood obesity an increasing problem, perhaps evolution really does have something to say about it.

      honestly, there need to be some serious efforts made to show people how much they actually need to eat. there's such a thing with alcohol, (not that many abide by it) with the "standard drink". perhaps instead of stupid coloured boxes with percentages on them, a meal could be given a simple "1.5 standard meals" and be done with it.

    5. Re:Treatmen woo! by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

      Wouldn't you rather he just be able to take a pill?

      Many, many more people would live longer, more pleasant lives.

      Speaking of which, is there any way to take this drug now?

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
    6. Re:Treatmen woo! by Phrogman · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I have never eaten too much. I got T2 Diabetes all the same - because it can be genetic it seems.

      --
      "The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
    7. Re:Treatmen woo! by Intrepid+imaginaut · · Score: 1

      Yes you will get fat, and if you eat enough of anything, you will get sick. Its a simple equation, energy in, energy out. What isn't used up or turned into waste gets stored as fat. That's why its usually recommended for people who sit all day looking at screens to just eat less.

    8. Re:Treatmen woo! by Jesrad · · Score: 1

      "Its a simple equation, energy in, energy out."

      There is always a well-known solution to every human problem--neat, plausible, and wrong. H. L. Mencken

      It's a lot more complex than just "calories in, calories out", as evidenced in this kind of experiment: take healty mice, restrict their food by a mere 5%, and *surprise* they grow a lot more fat tissue at the expense of lean mass.

      If it really is just a problem of "balancing caloric incomes and expenses", then please explain why do people who restrict their calorie intake do not lose the amount of weight that corresponds to the missing calories, and why people who expand their calorie intake on purpose do not quite gain the weight that they should (some of them not gaining any weight at all) ?

      Metabolism adjusts towards the amount of energy available from your food, and not the other way around. That amount derives from the calories you eat, MINUS those that are diverted to long term storage in your adipocytes. If metabolism fails to adjust enough, or on the contrary if it overshoots, then you are looking at a metabolic problem: one of regulation of energy storage versus energy bioavailability, and not one of "bad behavior".

      --
      Maybe we deserve this world ?
    9. Re:Treatmen woo! by realityimpaired · · Score: 1

      Wouldn't you rather he just be able to take a pill?

      I think his point was that with a little willpower, diabetes can be managed with diet alone. No need for injections. Now, replacing the injections with a pill would be a huge advantage for most people, but they'd still need to monitor their blood glucose levels so they can treat urgencies with an injection.

    10. Re:Treatmen woo! by realityimpaired · · Score: 1

      honestly, there need to be some serious efforts made to show people how much they actually need to eat. there's such a thing with alcohol, (not that many abide by it) with the "standard drink". perhaps instead of stupid coloured boxes with percentages on them, a meal could be given a simple "1.5 standard meals" and be done with it.

      The problem is, where do you define the standard? The last major attempt to define "standard" nutrition rules in the US is the reason that so many people are obese in the first place. You had people crusading against saturated fats, and replacing them with trans fats which we now realize are significantly worse for you than the saturated fats they replaced, and you *still* have people crusading for high carb diets, even though those carbohydrates metabolize into glucose as a natural part of digestion (some of them, faster than table sugar does), and trigger insulin production which, among other things, is a hormonal cue for your body to start storing energy in fat cells. 40 years later, they're *still* teaching this crap in schools. You want to know why people are fat, it's because they've been fed bad information for their entire lives.

      or we could just eat less.

      Losing weight isn't difficult, but it's not as simple as eating less. In other words, it's not simply a question of calories in versus calories out: You have to eat the right food, too, or you could find that you're *still* gaining weight. There's a reason that Atkins actually worked for most people: he advocated getting rid of carbohydrates in your diet... big surprise, as soon as people went back to eating so much bread, the weight went back on. Now, you need a small amount of carbs in your natural diet, but humans did not evolve to eat a diet based on grains, we evolved eating high fat and savory foods like meat, nuts, and legumes. Mother nature isn't stupid... there's a reason you crave fatty foods. They're more filling, and they take longer to digest, and because of that they promote weight loss.

    11. Re:Treatmen woo! by advocate_one · · Score: 2

      I think his point was that with a little willpower, diabetes can be managed with diet alone. No need for injections.

      Sadly that is NOT true... the elevated blood glucose levels after meals cause damage to the beta cells in the pancreas killing them off. No matter how tightly controlled your diet is, you will be killing some cells off with every meal you have. The point with diet control is to delay the progression to diet plus pills and then onto insulin... If you can keep your long term HbA1c levels down below 7%, then the secondary complications of Diabetes (blindness, amputations of lower extremities, kidney failure) will be kept at bay.

      --
      Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
    12. Re:Treatmen woo! by moeinvt · · Score: 1

      "The last major attempt to define "standard" nutrition rules in the US is the reason that so many people are obese in the first place ... and you *still* have people crusading for high carb diets,"

      +1 insightful. That message was drilled into people's heads for so many years, I can't even remember when it started.
      "Eat a bunch of grains and fruits while minimizing fat and you'll be healthy." Total BS. I'll never again believe anything that the government or the medical industrial complex tries to tell me.

    13. Re:Treatmen woo! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Losing weight isn't difficult, but it's not as simple as eating less.

      I'll vouch for this. My wife started on a diet to get to the doctors recommend weight. The first thing we did was look at what she eats in a normal day to find out what has a high calorie count. After a few days of logging EVERYTHING, we realized that she was only consuming between 1100-1300 calories/day(she has been trying to lose weight for a long time). Since cutting calories consumed wasn't the issue, we decided to change what she ate. Being that until recently we didn't have much money, we decided to start spending more money on fruits/veggies, which we previously could not afford on a regular basis. Her calories consumed went UP, but her weight has been going down. She has been steadily losing 1-2Lbs every week for the past few months, first time in almost 10 years. With my anecdotal experience, I would say being poor can make you fat.

    14. Re:Treatmen woo! by contrapunctus · · Score: 1

      While you are not wrong.

      Perpetual machines don't exist and we can't get free energy out of nothing. Eventually, restricting diet will lower weight.
      And people really really don't realize how much they eat (they are not dishonest, they just don't realize).

    15. Re:Treatmen woo! by Taibhsear · · Score: 1

      My sister who almost died from pancreatitis by doing just that would disagree with you. Did it to try to be healthier and lose weight at that. Triglycerides shot through the roof, pancreas swelled to the size of a large intestine with fluid that needed to have a drainage port surgically implanted. You clearly aren't a doctor or certified nutritionist.

    16. Re:Treatmen woo! by macs4all · · Score: 1

      Parent's comment is WAY too eugenic at the end, and he "human slugs" epithet is entirely uncalled-for (especially when followed up with the correct statement that this is primarily an evolutionary process that is now out-of-step with our current (temporary) food supply situation).

      However, the parent's assessment of the cause of most type II diabetes, and how it so neatly correlates with body-type, is spot-on.

      I disagree, however, that evolution doesn't play much of a part in this, or else we wouldn't have so many "human slugs". Quite the opposite.

    17. Re:Treatmen woo! by Ironhandx · · Score: 2

      common myth about Type 2 diabetes is that it is caused by over-eating.

      This is in no way the case.

      Certain people are genetically pre-disposed to type 2 diabetes. Over-eating on carbs is simply a very good trigger for the diabetes, this is what causes the correlation.

      However while quantity can definitely cause the onset faster, just eating a slice of bread a day for someone that has the pre-disposition will eventually trigger it. Any kind of what most people would consider "normal" quantity of refined sugars and carbs will definitely trigger it eventually.

      As with all things genetic you can be more susceptible than others of course, but the only real way to avoid getting it if you know you are pre-disposed to being a type 2 diabetic is multivitamins and a meat-heavy diet combined with a smaller selection of nutritious fruits and veggies.

    18. Re:Treatmen woo! by macs4all · · Score: 1

      The problem is, where do you define the standard? The last major attempt to define "standard" nutrition rules in the US is the reason that so many people are obese in the first place. You had people crusading against saturated fats, and replacing them with trans fats which we now realize are significantly worse for you than the saturated fats they replaced, and you *still* have people crusading for high carb diets, even though those carbohydrates metabolize into glucose as a natural part of digestion (some of them, faster than table sugar does), and trigger insulin production which, among other things, is a hormonal cue for your body to start storing energy in fat cells. 40 years later, they're *still* teaching this crap in schools. You want to know why people are fat, it's because they've been fed bad information for their entire lives.

      You are exactly correct! In fact, shortly after I was diagnosed as a Type II diabetic, I went into my Dr.'s office with a "food pyramid" that I had (re) designed. It was essentially the INVERSE (but not quite) of the USDA food pyramid we've been seeing all our lives in the U.S.

      My Dr. took one look at it and said "You should patent this."

      I have another comment regarding caloric restriction and weight loss: IT DOESN'T FUCKING WORK!

      Unless you truly get to concentration-camp levels of food-deprivation, that same genetic predisposition to weight gain also allows most people alive today to SERIOUSLY "turn down the metabolic fires" if their bodies even get a HINT that food is becoming more scarce. And the more often someone "yo-yo diets" (diets then stops, then starts again), the more pronounced the effect. In fact, there was a study where they yo-yo dieted some rats (or mice) a few times, then they tried to make them lose weight through caloric restriction. They found that they literally had to STARVE the rats to get them to lose weight!

      No one has that much "willpower". And no one who is naturally thin has any right to say differently. Period.

      The late Dr. Atkins was right on. Using a slightly self-modified version of his suggested diet plan, I was personally able to drop 85 pounds in nine months, and that was without one bit of exercise, and without "going hungry" even a little bit.

      Your body derives energy by converting foodstuffs to glucose, through processes of varying complexity (and energy-conversion COST). Mother nature isn't stupid; so your body (mostly) converts the easiest-to-reduce-to-glucose substances first. This means your body will convert, in decreasing order of preference:

      1. Simple Sugars (glucose, fructose primarily). That's why Gatorade has GLUCOSE in it.

      2. Complex Sugars (sucrose, dextrose, maltose(?) )

      3. Carbohydrates (I won't get into the simple and complex carbohydrates levels here, or the Glycemic Index (which all this is based on))

      4. Body Fat stores. There is a hormone called Glucagon that is responsible for this. It is kind of the "anti-insulin".

      5. Ingested Fats. These take (far) more energy to convert to glucose than internal fat stores, which is why EATING FAT DOES NOT MAKE YOU FAT!

      6. Ingested Proteins. These generally raise the blood glucose only slightly, and primarily contribute other things to the body (L-Arginine, L-Orinthine, etc.). BUT, in food-scarce (or dieting) times, they also keep your body from consuming its food-of-last-resort: YOU.

      7. Proteins from the body itself. That's the "You", above. When your body has to resort to this "food", death usually soon follows...

      So, with the list above, it is easy to see that simply restricting carbohydrates FORCES the body to do its normal "food selection" routine, and so it picks the next-easiest "food", which is BODY FAT. "Burning" body fat produces a "combustion by-product", a Ketone, which then is eliminated through the urine. That is why some Atkins followers use "Ketostix(r)" to monitor this activity, and why the sugar-lobby keeps ha

    19. Re:Treatmen woo! by macs4all · · Score: 1

      With my anecdotal experience, I would say being poor can make you fat.

      RIGHTY-O!!! Give that man a Grapefruit!!!

      There ain't NUTHIN' cheaper than CARBOHYDRATES!!!

      In fact, my personal Atkins experiment ended because I simply couldn't AFFORD to carbohydrate-restrict anymore, due to unemployment.

    20. Re:Treatmen woo! by macs4all · · Score: 1

      In fairness, the majority of people who find themselves in this situation are actually a victim of their mouth; as in what they've been putting into it for the previous many years. In far too many cases, people have diabetes because they are horribly obsese and they are horribly obese because they've crammed cookies down their own throat without any regard for their long term prognosis.

      In fairness, I never grew up in a household that had "the cookie jar", or a mom that baked cakes, pies, etc. often. We also did NOT have sweetened drinks (pretty much just water or unsweetened tea). And yet, as soon as I hit puberty (thanks, God! (rollseyes)), I INSTANTLY went from "so-skinny-they-thought-I-had-leukemia" (really!), to a BLIMP. It happened over a period of less than a year.

      So don't give me your pious bullshit about "cramming cookies", fucktard.

    21. Re:Treatmen woo! by macs4all · · Score: 1

      That's why its usually recommended for people who sit all day looking at screens to just eat less.

      And that's why it never works. Because it ISN'T just a "simple equation"; because there are compensatory feedback mechanisms in place.

    22. Re:Treatmen woo! by macs4all · · Score: 1

      While you are not wrong.

      Perpetual machines don't exist and we can't get free energy out of nothing. Eventually, restricting diet will lower weight. And people really really don't realize how much they eat (they are not dishonest, they just don't realize).

      Your "solution" only works under the conditions of "The Final Solution".

      NO living being has the "willpower" to ignore continual, gut-gnawing hunger, with the weakness and illness that accompanies it.

      While I certainly agree that today's nutritionally-dense foods are very easy to lose track of, it just isn't possible to ask people to VOLUNTARILY "starve themselves". It almost NEVER works.

      And it is not because people lack the "willpower". It's because we're genetically-predisposed to make FOOD a priority, even over sex...

    23. Re:Treatmen woo! by mug+funky · · Score: 1

      i find this and GP's post very interesting.

      i've certainly observed this phenomenon in some towns i've been to (typically rural areas, but ghost-town sort of feeling - an old port that was made redundant by the expansion of a more major port near a bigger town, that kinda thing). i don't fully understand it because i'm sort of inner city and have access to more than just the local supermarket.

      my wife and i are getting a business off the ground and everything i earn is going into it. plus we have a 13 month old kid, so things are extremely tight. diet wise, we're finding that meat is the most expensive item, and honestly if you do it right you can cut it almost entirely, or stretch that 1 chicken very far indeed (ie use absolutely all of it - everything not eaten gets made into a stock, and the softened bony crap left over goes to the dogs). iron can be had from roo meat, which is a fair bit cheaper here (an amazing cut will cost you less that a crap cut of beef and taste a lot better). pasta sorts out the carbs, and homemade bread. there's always rice if needed, potatoes are cheap as at the moment (cheaper than sugar too, which is rare). greens grow in the garden, but it's a tiny garden so i wouldn't rely on it for more than the vitamin content, and veggies are actually pretty cheap if you go to the market (even the supermarket isn't ridiculous). canned tomato, chickpea and butter-beans make up the rest of it. all this for about AU30 bucks a week. we're brewing our own beer and distilling our own vodka/gin/bourbon/whatever.

      neither of us go hungry, and neither of us are overweight (though my little son puts away as much as i do...)

    24. Re:Treatmen woo! by badkarmadayaccount · · Score: 1

      Don't get incest mixed up with the rest - it doesn't have health consequences except sex being good for you. I'm inclined to argue about weed as well, and this is coming from someone treating an addiction to the same.

      --
      I know tobacco is bad for you, so I smoke weed with crack.
  2. It's like that radio commerial... by nonsequitor · · Score: 2, Informative

    Part of you is worried about your weight, but All of you wants a Baby! Call XYZ fertility clinic today.

    1. Re:It's like that radio commerial... by level_headed_midwest · · Score: 1

      ...where they put you on diabetes medication (metformin.)

      --
      Just "gittin-r-done," day after day.
    2. Re:It's like that radio commerial... by macs4all · · Score: 1

      ...where they put you on diabetes medication (metformin.)

      As diabetes meds go, it's the best and safest by far. And in fact, it may even have anti-cancer benefits!

  3. Cryptochrome by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    is like the coolest word ever.

    1. Re:Cryptochrome by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Sounds like the color of Neal Stephenson's bike.

    2. Re:Cryptochrome by Drishmung · · Score: 1

      I rather like adrenochrome—the word that is.

      --
      Protoplasm. Quiet Protoplasm. I like quiet protoplasm.
    3. Re:Cryptochrome by rrohbeck · · Score: 3, Funny

      Sounds like some really old Kodak stuff dug up by archaeologists.

      --
      thegodmovie.com - watch it
    4. Re:Cryptochrome by mug+funky · · Score: 1

      like their short-lived experiment in photochemical stenography?

  4. Re:Treatment woo! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    And well managed diabetics may yet still age more rapidly than non-diabetics. I am one of them.

  5. Re:article has holes by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Ya trying to RTFA is waste of brain cells and time as you try to fill in the gaps.
    You should read the proper article at Science Daily instead (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/07/120712144749.htm)

    It's atrocious when a blog copies a real article and then cuts out words to probably claim that it's an original piece, or something along those lines.

  6. Re:don't get yer hopes up by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Yes the number of calories does not change. How your body handles those calories do.

    I do some casual bodybuilding. If I consume all my protein goodness early in the day then my body burns the food for energy. If I eat it at night then my body says 'Hey! I don't need energy right now and this protein could really be great at patching up all that worn muscle tissue.' If my caloric intake as a whole does not compensate for the loss of calories during the day then I lose fat and gain muscle.

    The time of day you eat certain things changes four hours of muscle building, fat burning deliciousness into four hours of sweaty it-isn't-doing-anything exhaustion.

  7. Re:don't get yer hopes up by Ocker3 · · Score: 2

    Actually no, food eaten within three hours of going to sleep tends to get turned directly into fat and not properly broken down into the normal nutrients, so the timing of food consumption can make a difference.

  8. Re:don't get yer hopes up by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

    Well, mere obesity and heart disease will be an improvement over obesity, heart disease, and diabetes. Sad but true.

    And maybe if you stop feeling like shit all the time...

    --
    (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
  9. My wife will just have to wait by cvtan · · Score: 5, Funny

    until there is a Treatwomen.

    --
    Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
    1. Re:My wife will just have to wait by Dan+East · · Score: 1

      Don't you mean Treatwom?

      --
      Better known as 318230.
    2. Re:My wife will just have to wait by LongearedBat · · Score: 1

      It should be either treatwoment or treatpeoplet.

    3. Re:My wife will just have to wait by cvtan · · Score: 1

      Yes, now that someone has ruined everything by fixing the typo!

      --
      Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
  10. Cycloset by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    There is a little known drug on the market called Cycloset that works for Type 2 Diabetes, and part of it is working on the biological clock. Its been around a few years, but it was out of patent before it got approved so most doctors don't even know about it.

    1. Re:Cycloset by macs4all · · Score: 1

      There is a little known drug on the market called Cycloset that works for Type 2 Diabetes, and part of it is working on the biological clock. Its been around a few years, but it was out of patent before it got approved so most doctors don't even know about it.

      Oh, you mean Parlodel Bromocriptine! That drug has been around for years, and has long been the darling of life-extension advocates as a powerful antioxidant. It is yet another ergot alkaloid discovered by the late, great Dr. Albert Hoffman. In fact, Durk and Sandy Pearson first spoke of its MANY benefits in their way-ahead-of-its-time book "Life Extension: A Practical Scientific Approach", reportedly published in 1982 (although I swear it was a few years earlier). It's a very interesting book, and well worth trying to find. I'm glad to see that Bromocriptine is finally getting a little love. In fact, speaking of "love", Bromocriptine also inhibits Prolactin, which is widely thought to decrease sex drive. So it's a win-win-win drug!

  11. Error in TFA by techno-vampire · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Reading TFA (Yeah, yeah, I know. However, I'm Type II, and this might be important to me.) I see that it says, "Diabetes is caused by a buildup of glucose in the blood, which can lead to heart disease, stroke, kidney failure and blindness." Wrong! the buildup of glucose in the blood is a symptom of diabetes, not the cause. I gather that this is just a blog post, not the original report so this might just be the blogger not knowing as much about the subject as he thinks he does. Still, it does make you wonder how many other errors are in TFA for the same reason.

    --
    Good, inexpensive web hosting
    1. Re:Error in TFA by DeadManCoding · · Score: 1

      Wow... As a med school student, you should know that DM II symptomatically is excessive or low glucose in the body. Hence the reason for testing using blood. DKA is primarily keytones (sp?) in the urine. The only reason I know this is d/t Type 1 myself. All hospital testing I've seen and been part of is blood, no urine.

      Now, in all honesty, I'm not sure what the testing differences is for DM Type 2, so I could be very off. Most of my own patients use blood for testing as well. I think the only reason for urine testing is for very excessive glucose. We're talking 1000+ BG. Once DKA sets in, you can test urine for those keytones to determine BG. The good news is that I'll be the first to say that I could be wrong.

      --
      "The only constant in the universe is change." - Unknown author
    2. Re:Error in TFA by sprior · · Score: 1

      Gosh I hope not because you've got it totally wrong. The official diagnosis for DM is a high fasting blood glucose and/or a high glucose tolerance test, but again both of these are symptoms of the disease, not the cause.

    3. Re:Error in TFA by girlintraining · · Score: 2, Interesting

      "Diabetes is caused by a buildup of glucose in the blood, which can lead to heart disease, stroke, kidney failure and blindness." Wrong! the buildup of glucose in the blood is a symptom of diabetes, not the cause.

      It's not an inaccurate statement. Clinically, abnormally high glucose levels after fasting is diagnostic for the disease. Although, like all things in biology, it's not the root cause; High glucose levels are due to insulin resistance. Insulin resistance is not fully understood but it is is often found in patients who are obese. This is why diabetes is referred to as a syndrome. There are many potential causes, and it varies from patient to patient. Obesity is the most common medical condition found co-existing (comorbid) with diabetes.

      So just because the author didn't describe the full pathology of the disease, that doesn't make him wrong. If you have high glucose levels, you (very likely) have diabetes. In layman's terms, that's the cause.

      --
      #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
    4. Re:Error in TFA by techno-vampire · · Score: 1

      The only reason I know this is d/t Type 1 myself. All hospital testing I've seen and been part of is blood, no urine.

      I'm Type II, diagnosed just over ten years ago when my doctor was trying to find out what caused my first kidney stone. (never did) I'm not sure, but I'd guess that the original diagnoses was from a urinalysis, but I do know that I keep track of my blood sugar with twice-daily blood tests and the occasional A1c, also a blood test. I have several friends who have been (at least) suspected of developing Type II, and in all cases, they were given blood tests.

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    5. Re:Error in TFA by ColdWetDog · · Score: 1

      Wait. What?

      --
      Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
    6. Re:Error in TFA by chooks · · Score: 1

      As other sib posters of mine have pointed out, this is in fact wrong. Historically (as in Ancient Greece), tasting urine for sweetness was how the disease got its name (it's not called 'mellitus' for nothing!). These days the diagnosis is through measuring levels of sugar in the blood, although most recently, measuring the surrogate marker of HbA1c can now be used to make a formal diagnosis. Before this you could either do a fasting blood sugar level, a glucose tolerance test, or having a rip roaring single glucose level with evidence of end organ damage (among other ways of diagnosis, which I am sure there some).

      Testing of urine is done routinely (guideline is once per year) to look for microalbuminemia -- essentially damage to the renal apparatus caused by high blood sugar. If someone is in DKA, they would have high urine ketones, but this is not what is looked for in routine urine testing.

      Once the diagnosis is made, it can be categorized (e.g. Type I, Type II, iotragenic, neoplastic, etc...).

      --
      -- The Genesis project? What's that?
    7. Re:Error in TFA by techno-vampire · · Score: 2

      Type II diabetes current cause (if we ignore the obvious bad diet and lack of exercise) is an autoimmune response taking out insulin receptors in tissues.

      I know that Type I is an autoimmune disorder, but AFAICT, Type II isn't. Do you have any sources for your claim, or are you just making it up as you go along?

      --
      Good, inexpensive web hosting
    8. Re:Error in TFA by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

      A diagnosis can be by symptom, such as sugar in the blood or urine. This is not the same as what causes it.

      I still have a tough time telling if type II is the result of not enough insulin production or of insulin resistance.

      This study suggests another item, that the liver produces too much glucose. But would that still overwhelm your natural insulin? Wouldn't this just be part of the issue, even if true, with insulin resistance being the lion's share still?

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
    9. Re:Error in TFA by Antarius · · Score: 2

      However, I've heard Random People On The Internet talk about reduced insulin production (but not lack of production, which would be type I) being an issue in type II as well.

      That sounds like Diabetes LADA (Latent Autoimmune Diabetes in Adults), which people often nickname "Type 1.5"

      Interestingly, family history is still a factor, but it's family history of autoimmune disorders rather than diabetes. In my case, my father has a type of vasculitis that causes his immune system to attack non-vital parts of his own body (veins, bloody vessels, lungs and kidneys - nobody needs them), and after inheriting the flawed genes, my own immune system decides that the insulin-producing beta cells in my pancreas are the enemy.

      That leaves me with all of the 'benefits' of Types I and II, effectively. I get all of the fun of calculating and injecting doses of insulin, while none of the weight-loss! Lucky me.

      If I could only have been Type II DM. Then I could just take a pill and diet.

    10. Re:Error in TFA by sprior · · Score: 1

      I guess we're getting into semantics, but it's not a "root cause" of the disease which is what everyone here means when you say cause. Yes the symptom of high blood glucose does in itself cause other problems and because you can't cure the disease itself you end up managing the side effect of the disease to avoid the side effect of the symptom. But saying this is a cause of the disease is like a situation where a horse drawn wagon upsets an apple cart and the apples fly off and break a window. By your terms the apple cart is a cause of the accident. While the apples did cause damage, you wouldn't have that damage in the first place if the wagon which is the real cause hadn't come by.

    11. Re:Error in TFA by Raenex · · Score: 1

      Definition and diagnosis should not be confused.

      Indeed, though that seems to be exactly what you are doing.

      By definition, diabetes stands for excessive urination. Mellitus stands for sweet urine (sweet because the only way to diagnose in the early days was tasting). This is how diabetes mellitus is defined.

      That sounds like an old-school definition being taken too literally in the modern world. Here's what an actual medical dictionary says:

      "a variable disorder of carbohydrate metabolism caused by a combination of hereditary and environmental factors and usually characterized by inadequate secretion or utilization of insulin, by excessive urine production, by excessive amounts of sugar in the blood and urine, and by thirst, hunger, and loss of weightâ"see type 1 diabetes, type 2 diabetes"

      Notice that urine is just one characterization.

      and for type 2:

      "diabetes mellitus of a common form that develops especially in adults and most often in obese individuals and that is characterized by hyperglycemia resulting from impaired insulin utilization coupled with the body's inability to compensate with increased insulin production"

  12. Re:Sorry folks... by girlintraining · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Just commenting to undo a bad mod. Pity about the good mods, but dems da breaks.

    You need to stop doing that. Here on slashdot we have +1, Insightful (I agree with your political statement), -1, Flamebait (You said something bad about [religion]... Die Heathen!), +1, Funny (You said something obvious, but in a novel way), +1 Underrated (A lot of people are going to downmod you for this in meta, but I love you in secret), and -1, Overrated (I'm too cowardly to delurk and tell you why I disagree).

    Your post clearly indicates you are unaware of this and are attempting to moderate based on a novel concept known as 'merit'. I hope they mod you into oblivion, you community-destroying monster! You corrupt everything /. moderation is about. It's a debasement of our esteemed institution of knee-jerk moderation. :)

    P.S. Thanks.

    --
    #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
  13. That was obvious by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    It's obvious that obesity is related to problems of the biological clock. Their clock is always telling them it's lunch time.

    1. Re:That was obvious by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      You do realize that plenty obese people don't, in fact, eat any more than you? Not saying diet doesn't matter, but genetics and lack of excercise dominate.

    2. Re:That was obvious by slackware+3.6 · · Score: 1

      Maybe they don't eat more than me but it's what they eat that matters. No one got fat from cucumbers unless they inserted way to many.

    3. Re:That was obvious by rrohbeck · · Score: 5, Informative

      Mod parent up. What you eat determines how many calories you eat. Your digestive system senses volume, not calories. So if you eat easily digested simple carbs, you'll be empty within an hour and your stomach tells the brain "Feed Me!"
      Hence eat fiber, protein, good fats, no simple carbs, yada yada.

      --
      thegodmovie.com - watch it
    4. Re:That was obvious by paenguin · · Score: 1

      Your digestive system senses volume, not calories.

      Not true. Your digestive system senses volume and density. It's just not very good at sensing density of highly processed (condensed) food.

      --
      We should start referring to processes which run in the background by their correct technical name... paenguins.
  14. Re:FIRST by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    A warrior's drink.

  15. CRYPTO-CHROME by THE_WELL_HUNG_OYSTER · · Score: 1

    Doesn't Google already have that name trademarked or patented?

  16. Link Down. Try Here Instead... by RandCraw · · Score: 3, Informative

    http://ucsdnews.ucsd.edu/newsrel/science/09-15BiologicalClock.asp

  17. not the solution by hareball101 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    And how does this relate to the fact that children are getting Diabetes type 2 younger and younger, at an increasing rate?

    The answer is simple; carbohydrates.

    Most of our carbs come from plants more closely related to grass(corn, wheat), than to a vegetable

    Solution: eat grass fed animals, eat lots of root and leafy green vegetables and some fruit ... ditch the soda, pizza, pasta, burgers, donuts, etc.

    1. Re:not the solution by level_headed_midwest · · Score: 1

      Perhaps the nearly immobile lives that youngsters live has something to do with it as well? Recess and gym are a fraction of the time they used to be, if they even still exist in schools. You can't have kids memorizing material for the federally mandated achievement tests that determine a larger and larger chunk of cash-strapped school districts' budgets if they are outside running around. If that isn't enough "persuasion" to cut recess and gym, the fear of lawsuits if little Brayden (or Aiden or Kayden or Jayden) catches a hangnail as he trips over his own feet and falls into the mandatory two-foot-thick rubber mat on the playground will. It's no better at home. There is the same worry about Brayden catching a hangnail as at school, but now since it is unsupervised, you have to worry about (the one in ten million chance of) a child molester kidnapping Jimmy! Go out and supervise Brayden yourself? And miss watching "Jersey Shore?" That's ludicrous! Better to have Brayden stay inside.

      --
      Just "gittin-r-done," day after day.
    2. Re:not the solution by hareball101 · · Score: 1

      I understand what your saying, and you do make some good points, but I don't think humans should get obese due to lack of exercise. Some exercise is important, but only really important as a muscle builder. Walking everyday is all that should be needed.

      Weight with a normal diet self regulating. You eat until you get full, and this is primarily run by the hormone Leptin. Leptin is secreted by your fat cells, and the more circulating in your body, the more your appetite is inhibited. Unfortunately, carbohydrates block the hormones message, by causing Leptin Resistance.

      As you can see, this sets off a vicous cycle, where the only result can be overeating.

      It actually makes me mad that animal fats have been demonised by the media, when in reality, it's the carbohydrates that are causing all the problems. Animal fat is good for you.

    3. Re:not the solution by Kergan · · Score: 2

      Sounds like Atkins. According to some specialists, though, fructose (aka sugar, HFCS, etc.) is the carb you should be really worrying about:

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM

    4. Re:not the solution by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 3, Informative

      Most of our carbs come from plants more closely related to grass [msu.edu](corn, wheat), than to a vegetable

      Um, yeah - vegetables have very few carbs. If you want carbs, go for the starchy grains.

      This wasn't a problem until the last century. Either humans changed or something about the food supply changed. Surely a 20x increase in sugar intake per capita is coincidental - it must be the oatmeal.

      --
      My God, it's Full of Source!
      OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
    5. Re:not the solution by macs4all · · Score: 1

      Sounds like Atkins. According to some specialists, though, fructose (aka sugar, HFCS, etc.) is the carb you should be really worrying about:

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM

      Um, what you call "sugar" is not fructose. It is sucrose.

    6. Re:not the solution by hareball101 · · Score: 1

      Well what you said made sense up until the last sentence... but carbohydrates, i.e. your oatmeal, breaks down into sugar in the bloodstream.

    7. Re:not the solution by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 1

      but carbohydrates, i.e. your oatmeal, breaks down into sugar in the bloodstream.

      It's largely fiber, but yes, your body runs on glucose. You're going to get that glucose from starches or gluconeogenesis. What's important about the effect of various starches is the rate at which you get those glucoses. HFCS = instant glucose. Oatmeal = 2-3 hour slow release of glucose. Since your enzymes are rate-limited, your foods should be as well.

      --
      My God, it's Full of Source!
      OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
    8. Re:not the solution by hareball101 · · Score: 1

      You're absolutely right about the rate of glucose, that is effectively what we call the glycemic index, and lower GI means slower energy... which is good. But there is another source of energy, called Ketones, that the body can run on. When there is less glucose, the body can convert fat to ketones to produce energy.

    9. Re:not the solution by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 1

      When there is less glucose, the body can convert fat to ketones to produce energy.

      Yes, certainly you can get ketosis from lyposis, but you're also going to get gluconeogenesis at the same time, in healthy people. The acetyl-CoA can be inserted into the Krebs Cycle directly, and that can definitely provide energy, but the body is really greedy for glucose and will rob for it.

      I suspect if you're active enough the effects will balance out - the Inuit seem to do OK. They also eat a specific diet with lots of protective fatty acids, though. I have some friends who suppose an all-bacon diet will serve them as well...

      --
      My God, it's Full of Source!
      OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
    10. Re:not the solution by Raenex · · Score: 1

      What's important about the effect of various starches is the rate at which you get those glucoses. HFCS = instant glucose. Oatmeal = 2-3 hour slow release of glucose. Since your enzymes are rate-limited, your foods should be as well.

      It's been mentioned a fair amount on Slashdot: fructose seems to be the worst part about the high sugar intake, not the glycemic index. High-GI foods like rice are popular in Asia without the corresponding diabetes. Also, there have been a lot of studies now that explain how fructose can lead to diabetes.

      Of course, if you already have Type II diabetes, you're better off eating a diet that isn't high in carbs.

    11. Re:not the solution by Kergan · · Score: 1

      And sucrose is one glucose bound to a fructose, the latter of which gets metabolized in the liver -- per the video I linked to.

  18. interesting protein by kermidge · · Score: 1

    If memory serves, wasn't cryptochrome mentioned in the article last week about the cell in the sea trout's nose that apparently helps it navigate by using Earth's magnetic field? And a fellow provided two links to journal articles wherein the same protein featured in some not-well-understood fashion having to do with birds using geomagnetic nav?

    If so, strikes me as one very interesting protein.

  19. I love cryptochrome by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 1

    I used to shoot with it all the time - especially loved the way it captured blues and didn't overemphasize reds. Of course that was back before I switched to a camera with a digital sensor.

    --
    #DeleteChrome
  20. Just for diabetes? by gmuslera · · Score: 1

    Being able to control our biological clocks looks like having the potential to change our entire lives, even for non diabetic people.

  21. Re:don't get yer hopes up by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

    Not completely true.

    There was a study where prisoners were fed a half-calorie diet. Some were fed it in the morning, the others in the evening.

    Both groups lost weight, but the ones fed it in the evening lost it more slowly.

    --
    (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
  22. Re:don't get yer hopes up by rrohbeck · · Score: 1

    +1. GP's myth has been debunked many times.
    Of course, if you eat or drink sugary junk it gets converted mostly into fat any time of the day.

    --
    thegodmovie.com - watch it
  23. Percent of calories absorbed... by Covalent · · Score: 1

    There have been many studies regarding this phenomenon, but most of them show that the effect is small. In other words, if you eat foods at the "right" time, you might absorb fewer or burn more of them than if you eat at the "wrong" time. However, because the effect is small, eating 4,000 calories a day will still result in obesity long-term, regardless of what time of day you're eating them.

    Simply put, our bodies evolved to pack on the pounds in time of plenty and then miserly dole out that fat during lean times. During the present day in the 1st world (a time of plenty of easily-digested calories), the body just packs on the weight unless calorie restriction and exercise are done regularly.

    --
    Great warrior...hrmph! Wars not make one great.
  24. Re:don't get yer hopes up by wisnoskij · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Just spent a little while looking this up. There are a lot of opinions both ways, but all the scientific studies I could fine (for example: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18842774) implied/proved/gave evidence that night-time eating did in fact produce significantly more weight gain then the same amount eaten during the daytime.

    --
    Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
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  30. Still peddling the overweight myth... by advocate_one · · Score: 2
    They're still pushing the myth that obesity causes Type 2 Diabetes.

    So wrong according to latest research.

    --
    Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
    1. Re:Still peddling the overweight myth... by moeinvt · · Score: 1

      Interesting. I lean strongly toward the "nature" side of the nature/nurture argument, so I think this is good material. However, you can see how the overweight "myth" is at least theoretically compelling.

      We're definitely witnessing an observable phenomenon in the (American) population with higher rates of obesity and higher rates of child obesity coupled with a higher incidence of type2 diabetes occurring earlier in life. I don't think the data is in dispute, so obviously "something" is going on. It seems odd that there could be an evolutionary force that was so strongly and so suddenly selecting for the "diabetes genes". This is at most a 1-2 generation phenomenon. The fact that it has occurred contemporaneously with major changes in the "typical" diet makes it hard to discount a correlation. Maybe it's not "obesity". Perhaps mega-doses of HFCS or some other additives are "triggering" these genes, even in people who are able to maintain "healthy" weight?
      This change in the population has occurred so rapidly that it's very difficult to dismiss a lifestyle-related driver as a "myth" despite research to the contrary.

    2. Re:Still peddling the overweight myth... by swb · · Score: 1

      From what I've read and seen (guys like Gary Taubes and Robert Lustig), the amount of sugar (which includes sugar, HFCS and other similar sweeteners comprised of fructose/glucose combinations) consumption per capita has increased tremendously over the last century.

      Equally important is the increase in carbohydrate consumption since most food guidelines switched to a "low fat" paradigm about 1980. Carbs are 4 kcals per gram, fat is 9, so switching to a "low fat" diet is essentially a "high carb" diet since it requires > 2x increase in carb consumption to make up for the lost calories. For most people this results in a large increase in starch consumption which is metabolically similar to sugar consumption.

      Unfortunately there hasn't been enough science associated with carbohydrate consumption done because there is such a broad acceptance of the "low fat/high carb" dietary paradigm because so many researchers are tied to it in terms of their careers, intellectual standing and mindset.

      Personally, I think sugar is a major culprit, with fructose being the worst member, followed fairly closely by simple starches. I also think there is some kind of metabolic programming that occurs early in life that makes obesity hard to shake in later life, even on strictly reduced carbohydrate diets.

       

  31. Epidemic by dutchwhizzman · · Score: 1

    A disease is epidemic if it is contagious and a certain percentage of the population is infected. Even though (morbid) obesity is common enough for the percentage requirement to be fulfilled, obesity is not a contagious disease. It is completely self inflicted, because people that have it got it by eating too much and/or the wrong diet.

    The only mitigation for that is, once your body has made the fat reserves that make you obese, you can diet but they won't go away. Sure, they'll get smaller, but once you stop your diet and exercise that got your weight back to normal, your body will try and restore those reserves. That means that you'll have to be much more careful about your diet for the rest of your life, once you've gained weight, even if you lost the weight afterwards. Liposuction does help in that, because the cells are removed that store the fat, but you really have to ask yourself if that is what you want, given the fact that a healthy diet and enough exercise will probably make you heal without the procedure.

    Calling obesity epidemic makes it sound like it's something that people got due to something out of their control, while it's something they really did to themselves, or their children.

    --
    I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
    1. Re:Epidemic by Rich0 · · Score: 1

      I'm not convinced that obesity is controllable - if anything high body weight is just like high blood sugar and is just a symptom of an underlying problem.

      It seems to me that one of two things is true:
      1. People today just are psychologically different from generations past and eat way too much food voluntarily. Maybe we all committed too many sins in our childhood or something. I've yet to hear a compelling explanation for why most of the US population voluntarily overeats.

      2. There is some underlying physical issue that causes improper regulation of diet. Many proposals have been offered for this, including changes in diet/etc.

      While blaming the victim may be convenient you still need to deal with a few issues:
      A. Whether self-inflicted or not, the majority of the people around you are obsese and are going to get diabetes.
      B. Those people are going to need a lot more medical care, which is expensive.
      C. Being the majority, those people have the power to compel you to help pay for their care.

      So, whether you think they are morally deficient for C, or helpless victims, it is in everybody's interests to figure out what is going on and find some way of treating it. If the issue is #2 keep in mind that simply making food less available is simply going to make everybody REALLY hungry, and hungry people don't tend to make for a happy society (there is a reason the Romans made bread free).

    2. Re:Epidemic by moeinvt · · Score: 1

      I think it's merely the fact that throughout most of human evolution, the vast amount of our labor has been dedicated to acquiring enough food to survive. It's no surprise that we're "hard wired" to prefer foods with high caloric density. This is not a problem when food is scarce in general and there is rarely an opportunity for excess consumption, especially of fats and sugars.
      We still have that built in drive, but now live in an environment(USA anyway) with an over-abundance of cheap high calorie food which has been chemically engineered to satiate that desire. Couple that with the psychological warfare conducted by the food industry, and I think the result is predictable.

  32. Re:don't get yer hopes up by Rich0 · · Score: 1

    Perhaps a treatment would:

    1. Increase your calorie consumption by making you more active and less tired.
    2. Make you feel less inclined to eat the pint of Ben and Jerry's in the first place.

    Some people eat more than others, and some of the former gain more weight than others. Perhaps this is a result of genetics, and not moral inferiority. Honestly, I'm surprised we don't try to exorcise the obese the way many carry on these days...

  33. Link has "account suspended." by Stirling+Newberry · · Score: 1

    Does anyone have a good current link?

    --
    Fugue for Aaron Swartz
  34. Re:Epidemic / terminology by moeinvt · · Score: 1

    I agree with your point about obesity being largely linked to lifestyle choices but I don't think the use of "epidemic" implies "contagion". I heard a lecture where a researcher was presenting evidence suggesting a causal link between the incidence of cancer and proliferation of petro-chemicals in the environment. He described cancer as "an epidemic" in the U.S. merely due to the % of people who will get some form of cancer in their lifetime.

  35. Anec-data by boneglorious · · Score: 1

    So that's two anecdotes from a pair of the closest relatives you can get...Ima need a few before I find your study to be statistically significant.

    --
    Can I mod something +1 Scary if it's true but I wish it weren't?
    1. Re:Anec-data by boneglorious · · Score: 1

      (And to be clear, I'm not arguing that there is no cause-and-effect between overeating and obesity, but my anec-data tells me that at least some people that are clinically obese don't eat or worse than more than usual, they just have a completely different body type. So I'm just arguing against applying your assertion to *all* obese people. And your methodology.)

      --
      Can I mod something +1 Scary if it's true but I wish it weren't?
  36. Meth? by Frank+T.+Lofaro+Jr. · · Score: 1

    1. Increase your calorie consumption by making you more active and less tired.
    2. Make you feel less inclined to eat the pint of Ben and Jerry's in the first place.

    Methamphetamine!

    (or if you'd like to stay legal, those FDA approved diet pills which destroy your heart valves instead of your teeth).

    --
    Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
  37. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  38. How about a ketogenic diet? by swb · · Score: 1

    How about research into that? The reputable sources and limited studies show that obese people with type II diabetes almost all seem to revert to a non-diabetic status once they go on a ketogenic (very low carbohydrate diet).

    While there are certainly some portion of type II diabetes sufferers who will not respond to, people like Robert Lustig seem to believe that low carb diets have an extremely high success rate in basically eliminating type II diabetes.

    But not eating carbs doesn't sell drugs or allow people to go on eating food toxified with high levels of HFCS.

  39. Atkins for vegetarians really sucks. by billstewart · · Score: 1

    I'm a vegetarian for ethical reasons. Our bodies may do just fine eating animal parts, considering that we've done it since at least the time we became apes, and we've been eating cooked animal parts since we figured out fire a million years or so ago, but it's a pretty hostile way to treat animals, just because they happen to be tasty and easy to catch. I'm also fat, and could stand to lose weight, but my blood sugar is just fine, stays nicely in the middle, not too high or too low.

    Most of the scientific studies of Atkins have found that it really causes weight loss by reducing your calorie intake, while keeping you from getting hungry while you do so, by tricking your metabolism into not doing all the things that tell you it's time to eat a lot. (And your chart left out the body's glycogen stores, BTW, which get used up before burning body fat.) All nice in theory.

    So back during one of the previous resurgences of the Atkins fad, I looked at what I'd be able to eat if I tried it. Eggs, cheese, yogurt, no grain or fruit, no beans, lots of green veggies and rabbit food. BORING! A lot more monotonous than eating all those with meat. And I'm mildly allergic to eggs and dairy, so I'd be sneezing more.

    No thanks. I'd rather eat fewer calories and substitute more garlic and peppers for the butter and salt. What I really need to do is step away from the computer and go do some cardio exercise; tai chi just doesn't count.

    --

    Bill Stewart
    New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
    1. Re:Atkins for vegetarians really sucks. by mug+funky · · Score: 1

      add spices and nothing is boring...

  40. Dr. Fuhrman on Diabetes by Paul+Fernhout · · Score: 1

    Might be helpful: http://www.drfuhrman.com/disease/Diabetes.aspx
    "How can we lower high glucose levels, lower cholesterol, lower blood pressure, lose weight and not need to take drugs such as insulin and sulfonylureas which cause weight gain? Here is the simple answer -- the best diet for humans to live longer in superior health is also the best diet for one with diabetes. That is a diet with a high nutrient per calorie ratio as described in my books, Eat To Live and Eat For Health. When one eats a diet predominating in nature's perfect foods -- green vegetables, beans, eggplant, tomatoes, mushrooms, onions, garlic, raw nuts and seeds and limited amount of fresh fruit, it becomes relatively easy for people to eat as much as they want and still lose weight relatively quickly. This includes lots of great tasting food and great recipes, but no oil, butter, cheese, flour or sweets. My experience has demonstrated that those choosing to follow my nutritional recommendation will have their diabetes controlled astonishingly fast even before they have lost most of their excess weight."

    Good luck to you and your dad.

    --
    A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
  41. Re:FIRST by oPless · · Score: 1

    Monday July 16 Wasn't a good day to FIRST POST (-1, offtopic)