Welcomed ‘Call for End to the Diet Debate’
Just before I departed for a week’s vacation and last blast of summer I spotted an intriguing tweet about the article A Call for an End to the Diet Debate in the August 21, 2013 issue of Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). I clicked to the recap in the tweet and was further intrigued. I recognized the name of the first author, Sherry Pagoto, PhD. Ah yes, I follow her on Twitter (@drsherrypagoto).
After arriving at our first home away from home in Asheville North Carolina and enjoying a yummy and healthy dinner of sushi, I sat down to digest the article...and sushi.
It warmed my heart. Thank you Drs Pagoto and Appelhans! I applaud your efforts and absolutely concur with your sentiments. They echo those I penned over a year ago in a blog titled How Much Carb, Protein or Fat? Does it Really Matter for Weight Loss or Keeping Pounds Off? and continue to speak about.
New Diabetes Numbers – Sound the Alert LOUDER
While we were experiencing a much ado about nothing “snow storm” in Washington, DC on March 6, 2013, hundreds of diabetes advocates were storming Capitol Hill for a cause we should be doing much about.
To kick off their advocacy day the American Diabetes Association’s (ADA) released findings from a report they commissioned, Economic Costs of Diabetes in the U.S. in 2012, at a press conference. Joining ADA leaders at the press event were Ann Albright, PhD, RD, director of CDC’s Division of Diabetes Translation, Judith Fradkin, MD, director of the National Institutes of Health’s division which encompasses diabetes (NIDDK) and several key members of the Congressional Diabetes Caucus, Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) and Senator Jean Shaheen (D-NH) (who has a granddaughter with type 1 diabetes I learned at AADE's advocacy day in 2012).
The stats presented by ADA are downright scary! It is, without a doubt, time to sound the alert about our prediabetes and type 2 diabetes epidemics louder and louder.
Check out a few key stats.* Read through these slowly and repeatedly, it takes a few readings to absorb their impact!
Book Review: Behavioral Approaches to Treating Obesity: Helping Your Patients Make Changes That Last
This is one in a series of book reviews. You may find these books beneficial if you: manage prediabetes or diabetes, follow a diabetes meal plan and/or try to eat healthy to live well. These book reviews also appear on amazon.com and the books can be found in my amazon a-store. Please check them out and consider a purchase.
Note: This book is geared to healthcare providers who help people make behavior changes. I’ve recently reviewed a similar book for healthcare providers Inspiring and Supporting Behavior Change: A Food and Nutrition Professional’s Counseling Guide.
No longer is it unusual to hear the term ‘obesity’ in our culture. While studies and books abound on the topic, Behavioral Approaches to Treating Obesity, Helping Your Patients Make Changes That Last, by experts Brigitta Adolfsson, PhD and Marilynn S. Arnold, MS, RD, have created an all-in-one resource and reference guide for healthcare providers (HCPs).
Behavioral Approaches to Treating Obesity begins with an in depth overview of the dismal statistics about obesity in America. The authors proceed to cover the multi-factorial nature of weight gain. They also discuss the possible ‘solutions’ for obesity which include bariatric surgery, obesity medications and/or healthy lifestyle changes.
Adolfsson and Arnold invite HCPs to view obesity from a different perspective…being open to every and all treatment modalities. In utilizing behavior change techniques for healthy lifestyle changes people make the decisions while the HCP interacts in a manner that supports the person’s well-being.
Book Review: Inspiring and Supporting Behavior Change: A Food and Nutrition Professional’s Counseling Guide
This is one in a series of book reviews. You may find these books beneficial if you: manage prediabetes or diabetes, follow a diabetes meal plan and/or try to eat healthy to live well. These book reviews also appear on amazon.com and the books can be found in my amazon a-store. Please check them out and consider a purchase.
Note: This book is geared to healthcare providers who help people make behavior changes. I’ve recently reviewed a similar book for healthcare providers Behavioral Approaches to Treating Obesity: Helping Your Patients Make Changes That Last.
Changing behaviors is a difficult process, period! When it comes to changing behaviors to impact health outcomes, frustrations can multiply for the person managing the condition and the healthcare providers (HCPs) encouraging the person to make changes.
Inspiring and Supporting Behavior Change: A Food and Nutrition Professional’s Counseling Guide, written by Ann Constance and Cecilia Sauter, both dietitians and Certified Diabetes Educators with years of expertise counseling people with diabetes, is a handbook designed to help HCPs learn to more successfully and effectively inspire people to make critically important behavior changes.
Insulin Resistance, Weight Gain and Type 2 Diabetes: Connect the Dots
Have you heard the terms insulin resistance, insulin sensitivity and metabolic syndrome in the same breath as prediabetes and type 2 diabetes? Do you wonder how these terms are intertwined with prediabetes and type 2 diabetes?
Learn the terms and gather action steps put them in reverse or at least slow their progression over time.
What Is Insulin Resistance?
Insulin resistance most often occurs in people who are overweight. People who carry their extra weight around their middle – the abdomen or waist line - are at increased risk. The medical term for that apple shape is central adiposity.
Out Raising Awareness During American Diabetes Month
The diabetes stats are downright staggering! Nearly 19 million people are diagnosed with diabetes in the U.S. and another 6 million are estimated to have diabetes but don’t yet know it. Add to this number, another 79 million people with prediabetes yet barely 10 percent of these throngs of people know they have it.
Unfortunately people continue to think of type 2 diabetes as a ho-hum disease and tend not treat it early and aggressively. Yet we know early and aggressive care of type 2 is exactly what keeps people healthier longer. And we know early awareness and action with prediabetes can prevent/delay the progression to type 2 diabetes.
So, to honor American Diabetes Month, I’ve grabbed every opportunity which has come my way to raise awareness, educate and promote action. Check out links to these guest blogs, videos, and interviews:
Parents: Time to Take a Seat AS Head of the Table
I’m just back from the American Diabetes Association’s 72nd Annual Scientific Sessions and I'm even more concerned about our diabetes epidemic. Prior to 10 year ago you never heard about type 2 diabetes in children or prediabetes. Not so today! Stats show 1 in 3 children born in 2000 or beyond will develop type 2 diabetes. Today nearly 80 million Americans (that’s over a quarter of our population!!) have prediabetes. The TODAY multicenter NIH trial, recently in the news and headliner at ADA, is downright scary! It showed that type 2 diabetes in youngsters progresses more quickly requiring more rapid progression through oral blood glucose lowering medications and on to insulin. A major concern with type 2 in youth is that with rapid disease progression and less than ideal control, these people may develop heart, kidney and eye disease just a couple of decades later. That's the prime of these childrens' lives.
A take away message from the 2012 ADA meeting is we’ve got to continue to beat the drum about preventing overweight BEFORE type 2 diabetes. The most cost effective approach is to encourage healthy eating from the start. I believe it’s absolutely critical for parents to take a seat AS the head of the table and serve up tough love when it comes to healthy eating.