Insulin, a hormone released from the pancreas, is the primary substance responsible for maintaining appropriate blood sugar levels. Insulin allows glucose to be transported into cells so that they can produce energy or store the glucose until it's needed. The rise in blood sugar levels after eating or drinking stimulates the pancreas to produce insulin, preventing a greater rise in blood sugar levels and causing them to fall gradually. Because muscles use glucose for energy, blood sugar levels fall during physical activity. See diabetes for a natural way to control this condition and lower the required dosage of insulin for optimal control. There are many medications that are prescribed to patients with high blood sugar levels including Januvia (sitagliptin phosphate) tablets.
Front Biosci (Elite Ed). 2015. Natural supplements for improving insulin sensitivity and glucose uptake in skeletal muscle. Type 2 diabetes is a common metabolic disorder characterized by resistance to the actions of insulin to stimulate skeletal muscle glucose disposal. In light of the staggering financial/human cost of type 2 diabetes, there is considerable need for safe and effective agents that can be used to prevent and/or adjunctively treat the disease. Available evidence suggests that a number of natural supplements, including cinnamon, biotin, fenugreek, ginseng, banaba, and alpha-lipoic acid, have the potential to reduce the risk for type 2 diabetes in the large at-risk population. The evidence also suggests that, when used adjunctively, these natural products are likely to help clinicians achieve optimal glycemic control, improve long-term prognosis, and/or minimize the need for insulin therapy in type 2 diabetics.
Inhalable Insulin
The first inhalable version of insulin won federal approval, giving
millions of adult diabetics an alternative to some of the regular injections
they now endure.
The Food and Drug Administration said the
Pfizer Inc. insulin, to be marketed as
“Exubera,” is the first new way of delivering insulin since the discovery of the
hormone in the 1920s. Pfizer jointly developed the drug and dispenser with
Sanofi-Aventis and Nektar Therapeutics.
Inhalable Insulin - Is it
cost effective?
Pfizer Inc's inhaled insulin product Exubera should not be prescribed on
Britain's state health service, the country's cost-effectiveness watchdog, NICE,
recommended in 2006. Pfizer, the world's biggest pharmaceuticals group,
said the preliminary opinion from the National Institute for Health and Clinical
Excellence (NICE) was "perverse and short-sighted". Exubera won marketing
approval in both Europe and the United States in January, 2006 as a treatment
for patients with Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes. But NICE -- whose function is to
assess whether treatments are cost effective for the National Health Service --
said it did not offer sufficient benefits over conventional insulin injections
to be worth the money. It estimated the cost of using Exubera to be 1,102 pounds
($1,931) per patient a year. That might be justified for people with severe fear
of injections, NICE's appraisal committee said, but there was no way of
identifying those who would gain sufficient benefit for the technology to be
cost effective.
Insulin resistance and how to reduce it, supplements,
vitamins, herbal remedies
Insulin resistance can be linked to diabetes, hypertension, high
cholesterol and triglycerides, cardiovascular disease and other abnormalities.
These abnormalities constitute the insulin resistance syndrome. Because
insulin resistance usually develops long before these diseases appear, identifying and
treating patients with insulin resistance has potentially great preventive value.
Insulin resistance is a condition in which tissues such
as fat and muscle in the body respond poorly to insulin, the major hormone
required for glucose metabolism. This condition is present in pre-diabetic
states and continues when a person develops diabetes. Research suggests that
supplementation with chromium picolinate may help improve insulin resistance.
However diet, weight loss, and exercise are the options to reduce insulin
resistance.
Insulin resistance is a state in which a given
concentration of insulin produces a less-than-expected biological effect.
Insulin resistance has also been arbitrarily defined as the requirement of 200
or more units of insulin per day to attain glycemic control and to prevent
ketosis.
Amino Acids. 2016. Physiological and therapeutic effects of carnosine on cardiometabolic risk and disease. Obesity, type 2 diabetes (T2DM) and cardiovascular disease (CVD) are the most common preventable causes of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Carnosine (β-alanyl-L-histidine) is a dipeptide with anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, anti-glycation, anti-ischaemic and chelating roles and is available as an over-the-counter food supplement. Animal evidence suggests that carnosine may offer many promising therapeutic benefits for multiple chronic diseases due to these properties. Carnosine, traditionally used in exercise physiology to increase exercise performance, has potential preventative and therapeutic benefits in obesity, insulin resistance, T2DM and diabetic microvascular and macrovascular complications (CVD and stroke) as well as number of neurological and mental health conditions.
High-calorie American diet causes insulin resistance
within days.
Chronic diseases have overtaken acute diseases, such as infections, as the major
cause of premature mortality worldwide. Diabetes mellitus, a chronic
degenerative metabolic disease, has reached epidemic proportions in the past 30
years, with worldwide prevalence approaching 400 million people.
Men aged 20 to 32 years with acne are more likely to have insulin resistance and to have higher fasting plasma glucose levels than age-matched controls.
Role of sleep
Just one sleepless night can hamper the body's ability to use insulin to process
sugar in the bloodstream. I may be no coincidence that while sleep duration has
shortened in western societies in the past decade there has also been an
increase in cases of insulin resistance and adult-onset diabetes. This is the
advantage of getting some physical activity during the day so that you can get a
deeper rest overnight.
Stress and Insulin Resistance
Individuals with high stress and high hostility levels have an increased
risk of developing insulin resistance, which occurs when the body's response to
insulin begins to slow down and blood sugar levels begin to rise. People with
insulin resistance have a high risk of developing diabetes.
Insulin resistance is associated with stress and certain personality factors,
including hostility.
Symptoms
The syndromes of insulin resistance actually have a broad clinical
spectrum, which includes obesity, glucose intolerance, diabetes, and metabolic
syndrome X. Many of these disorders are associated with various endocrine,
metabolic, and genetic conditions. These insulin resistance syndromes may also
be associated with immunological diseases. Syndrome X, the state of insulin
resistance also known as metabolic or dysmetabolic syndrome, has drawn the
greatest attention because of the public health importance. In an effort to
clinically identify patients with insulin resistance, various organizations have
developed diagnostic criteria. The most commonly used criteria in the United
States are those of the National Cholesterol Education Program / Adult Treatment
Panel III (NCEP/ATP III).
Green Tea effect
Randomized controlled trial for an effect of green tea consumption on
insulin resistance and inflammation markers.
J Nutr Sci Vitaminol. 2005. Department of
Nutritional Sciences, School of Food and Nutritional Sciences, University of
Shizuoka, 52-1 Yada, Shizuoka, Japan
To study the effects of the intake of green tea and polyphenols, which are a
component of green tea, on insulin resistance and systemic inflammation, a
randomized controlled trial was conducted on 66 patients aged 32-73 y (53 males
and 13 females) with borderline diabetes or diabetes. Subjects in the
intervention group were asked to take a packet of green tea extracts/powder
containing 544 mg polyphenols (456 mg catechins) daily, which was a dose that
could be taken without difficulty, and were asked to divide the green tea
extracts/powder in a packet into 3 or 4 fractions dissolved in hot water
everyday and to take a fraction after every meal or snack for 2 mo, in addition
to daily food intake. In conclusion, the daily supplementary intake of 500 mg
green tea polyphenols did not have clear effects on blood glucose level, Hb A1c
level, insulin resistance or inflammation markers. The positive correlation
between the level of polyphenol intake and insulin level warrants further
studies on the effect of green tea on insulin resistance.
Insulin Allergy
An allergic reaction develops in 2% of patients that use insulin. This
ranges in severity from erythema and pruritus to life-threatening
anaphylaxis. Allergic
reactions to insulin usually occur within a few hours after an injection and are
usually due to a local or systemic type I IgE-mediated hypersensitivity
reaction. Despite considerable research into the immunogenicity of insulin, this
has not yet been clarified completely and allergic reactions to insulin still
occur. A blood test for anti-insulin antibodies and intradermal skin tests are
indicated. There are several options available for the treatment of insulin
allergy and each patient should be evaluated individually.
Food, diet, blood sugar and insulin
Digestion of food in the intestines converts the compacted storage
carbohydrates, starch and glycogen, to glucose. After each meal, a flux of
glucose (more than 200 g) passes through the blood pool (4-6 g) in a short
period of 2 hours, keeping its concentration ideally in the range of 80-120
mg/100 mL. Tissue-specific glucose transporters (GLUTs) aid in the distribution
of glucose to all tissues. The balance glucose after meeting the immediate
energy needs is converted into glycogen and stored in liver (up to 100 g) and
skeletal muscle (up to 300 g) for later use. High blood glucose gives the signal
for increased release of insulin from pancreas. Insulin binds to insulin
receptor on the plasma membrane and activates its autophosphorylation. This
initiates the post-insulin-receptor signal cascade that accelerates synthesis of
glycogen and triglyceride. A major action of insulin is to inhibit
gluconeogensis in the liver decreasing glucose output into blood. Cases with
failed control of blood glucose have alarmingly increased in the past few
decades coinciding with changed life-styles and large scale food processing.
Insulin and appetite influence, weight control
Appetite and satiety are subject to complex regulation, with
neuroendocrine mechanisms playing an important role. The central nervous system
is attracting increasing attention as a target tissue for many hormones such as
leptin, PYY3-36, ghrelin, glucagon-like-peptide 1 and many others. Among its
many well-known functions, insulin is also a potent appetite suppressing
hormone, and insulin receptors are widely distributed throughout the central
nervous system.
Insulin and Alzheimer's disease
I was directed to your site by one of my patients, and I noticed that someone
had asked a question regarding Insulin and Alzheimer's. FYI, there is a growing
body of evidence for diabetes as a risk factor for AD. Furthermore, it is known
that beta amyloid is degraded by the insulin degrading enzyme (IDE) in the
brain, and in those with insulin-resistant diabetes, this means that the excess
insulin is preferentially degraded, leaving the beta amyloid to precipitate and
form plaques even earlier than one might expect to see them otherwise. Just
thought that info might be helpful. The information came from data presented by
Dr. Richard Mayeux of Columbia University at the 9th International Conference on
Alzheimer's Disease and Related Disorders, Philadelphia, July 2004.
Sincerely,
Amanda G. Smith, MD
Assistant Director, USF Suncoast Alzheimer's and Gerontology Center, Tampa, FL
33617
suncoastalzheimers dotcom
Questions
I am on insulin and have heard good things about
lipoic acid. Can I take
insulin and lipoic acid together?
We are not in a position to advise you on an
individual basis, but as a general rule, if the lipoic dosage is low, such as 20
mg or less, then there should be no problems using it with your insulin. If you
intend to take more lipoic, you should be monitored by your health care provider
since blood sugar may be influenced by lipoic acid.
Is
CoQ10 a good supplement for a diabetic on insulin to take?
No general statements can be made that apply to everyone, but
using 30 mg of CoQ10 a few times a week should be fine for most people,
including those on insulin, but your doctor needs to approve.
I am curious what supplements are recommended to
mitigate insulin insensitivity. I hear that cinnamin tablets are good?
Cinnamon is a good option, so is alpha lipoic acid, banaba,
bitter melon extract.
8th Annual World Congress on Insulin Resistance, Diabetes & Cardiovasular Disease (WCIR) Exploring of new frontiers in metabolism - tomorrow's clinical science today, 2010 Hilton Universal City Los Angeles, California Register NOW EARLY BIRD DISCOUNTCall for Abstracts Topics: Clinical topics may include any aspect of insulin resistance and its relationship to the causation and/or natural history of obesity, diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, dyslipidemia, gonadal dysfunction such as PCOS, gestational diabetes, other endocrine abnormality, inflammation, endothelial or other vascular dysfunction, liver disease (NAFLD), malignancy, and sleep apnea and other sleep disorders in childhood, adolescence and adulthood.All abstracts will be published in Diabetes & Vascular Disease Research. Awards will be given for the highest-ranking abstracts. The chosen winning abstracts will orally present their research findings during plenary session. This year's congress will focus on Diabetes and Cardiovascular Disease. Here are few Highlights: Dyslipidemia Session Chair: Ronald M. Krauss, MD Berkeley, California The gut in metabolic control- Relationship of the gut, gut hormones IR, energy balance, metabolic diseases Session Chair: Bart Staels, PhDLille, France Pediatrics Session Chairs: Alan R. Sinaiko, MD Minneapolis, Minnesota Sonia Caprio, MD New Haven, Connecticut Brain Relationship: energy balance, metabolic diseases appetite to the gut Session Chair: Suzanne Craft, PhD Seattle, Washington.