Posts Tagged ‘diabetes’

Applying the science of health outcomes research to social determinants of health is bringing surprising insights. In fact, for chronic diseases like obesity, heart failure, and diabetes, delivering better nutrition might do more than merely prescribing medicine can. Also, it seems to seems to offer good value for money. Food Is Medicine? This catchphrase sometimes […]

We have an effective treatment for preventing diabetes. It cuts the risk by 60 percent in people with prediabetes. For every person on Medicare, it saves $2,650. In just 15 months. But Medicare can’t figure out how to make it available to the people who need it. This is the sad story of implementing the […]

A new study in JAMA will be quite important for thinking about pregnancy and severe obesity. That’s because pregnancies for women with severe obesity carry a high risk for complications. Birth defects are more common with obesity. They’re also more common with poor glucose control that’s more likely when a pregnant woman has obesity. But […]

Why is the switch so much more effective for reversing diabetes than gastric bypass? It’s an uncommon procedure more specifically known as biliopancreatic diversion with duodenal switch. New research in Cell Metabolism provides some answers. Hint: it’s not all about the weight loss. Better Insulin Sensitivity Conventional wisdom holds that this procedure is simply a […]

Holy grail? Game-changer? These superlatives were flying around as FDA approved Rybelsus – oral semaglutide – yesterday for type 2 diabetes. We don’t know about all that puffery, but it’s clear enough that this approval is a big deal. Oral semaglutide will be the first ever GLP-1 agonist in a pill. Up until now, taking […]

A new study in Diabetologia tells us that shortness may heighten a person’s risk for type 2 diabetes. Over seven years, researchers observed a higher risk for type 2 diabetes among shorter people in a cohort of 2,500 individuals. Age, lifestyle, education, and waist circumference didn’t explain it. Even after accounting for those factors, the […]

Is some knowledge ever enough? A new study in the Journal of the American Medical Association begs that question. Researchers found that patients with diabetes and obesity were less likely to die or have other major bad outcomes if they have bariatric surgery. The list of bad outcomes includes heart attacks, strokes, heart failure, kidney […]

Believe it or not, your body has an organ that serves as an efficient little heater. It’s brown fat. Obesity geeks might call it brown adipose tissue. Or BAT for short. For some time now, BAT has fascinated obesity scientists. Adding to their excitement is a new study last week in Nature. The research documents […]

For African American men, a new study tells us frequent church attendance predicts double the risk of obesity. That’s versus men who seldom attend. But in these data, researchers found no such link for women. Health in Faith-Based Settings Keisha Bentley‑Edwards used data from the National Survey of American Life. It’s a fascinating study with […]

We have a problem. Right now, roughly a hundred million people in the U.S. have obesity. This is a chronic disease that leads to diabetes, heart disease, certain forms of cancer, liver disease, osteoarthritis, and a host of other conditions. But for the most part, people receive no medical care for obesity. A new report […]