On: Type 2 Diabetes and Your Lifestyle

Filed in archive Information on June 14, 2007

Let's get something straight, type 2 diabetes is a lifestyle disease - it is brought about, more often by weight gain or obesity which is usually blamed to the western lifestyle.

Type 1 diabetes on the other hand is not and is a totally different story.

However, in both types, lifestyle changes are detrimental to the management of the disease.

Now that those are clear, lifestyle fortunately is something than can be changed or adjusted. There definitely will be difficult times of adjustment but it can be done. Diet (low-cal, low-fat), choosing the right kinds of food (low-sugar, no-sugar, etc.) and most importantly - exercise.

We have been told again and again the exercise is beneficial to diabetics, there are scientific evidences that back this claim, the most recent one is definitely not the first to remind us about the benefits of exercise.

When diet and exercise aren't enough to manage type 2 diabetes, this is where diabetes drugs come in - to help the patient control his/her blood sugar levels. Though there has been some recent claims that the use of diabetes drugs to manage diabetes isn't justifiable.

While I am not totally convinced, other school of thoughts on diabetes believe that lifestyle adjustment alone is enough to manage this condition.

Well, like any other serious disease, type 2 diabetes can also be a case-to-case basis. Like in the case of the extremely obese, gastric bypass surgery is gaining "popularity" as an option that not only takes care of obesity but also type 2 diabetes.

I personally believe that surgery should be the last option and only for the extremely obese. Those moderately overweight and are battling with type 2 diabetes should exhaust to the fullest, the potential of both lifestyle changes and appropriate diabetes drugs when necessary.