[이데일리 유진희 기자] Issues from the global pharmaceutical and bio industry were collected for a week (May 30th – June 5th). This week, research on type 2 diabetes took notice. New facts have been revealed regarding the prevention and management of type 2 diabetes.
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◇Whey protein intake before meals to improve blood sugar management
The Science Daily reported that a research team led by Dr Daniel West of the Diabetes Lab at the Center for Human Nutrition Research at the University of Newcastle, UK, published a study showing that consuming a small amount of whey protein before meals improves blood sugar control in diabetic patients.
The research team had 18 people with type 2 diabetes drink a drink (100 mL) containing 15 g of whey protein 10 minutes before breakfast, lunch, and dinner for one week. I was told to take the diabetes medication I was taking on a regular basis.
For comparison, they were given a whey-free drink before meals for another week. At the same time, using a continuous blood glucose meter (CGMS), the changes in blood glucose were monitored daily.
As a result, there was a marked difference in blood sugar depending on whether or not whey protein was taken. During the week of drinking the whey protein drink, normal blood sugar levels were maintained by an average of two hours a day longer than during the week of not drinking the whey protein drink. In addition, the average daily blood sugar level dropped by 0.6 mmol/L (regarding 10.8 mg/dL).
The researchers found that whey protein stimulates a number of important hormones that keep sugar from rising rapidly. Whey protein, a clear liquid from the cheese-making process, is known to have effects such as satiety and weight control because it is digested and absorbed better than other proteins.
The results of this study were published in the latest issue of the British Medical Journal Open Diabetes Research & Care (BMJ Open Diabetes Research & Care).
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◇Vitamin D, preventive effect of type 2 diabetes is not clear
Contrary to expectations, the results of large-scale clinical trials showed that vitamin D was not effective in preventing type 2 diabetes.
Healthday News reported that Professor Tetsuya Kawahara’s research team at Kitakyushu University of Industrial Medicine in Japan published the results of the clinical trial in the online edition of the British Medical Journal (BMJ).
All trial participants had impaired glucose tolerance with a high risk of diabetes. Impaired glucose tolerance is a condition in which blood sugar is higher than normal, but not high enough to make a diagnosis of diabetes. They had an average age of 61 years (30-78 years), 46% were female, and 59% had a family history of type 2 diabetes. 43.6% had a vitamin D blood level of less than 50 nmol/L (20 ng/mL), which was below the normal level.
The research team randomly divided them into two groups, and 630 people received a standard dose (0.75 μg) of eldecalcitol supplement, an active vitamin D, daily, and the remaining 626 people received a placebo. In addition, they were followed up for 3 years while checking the occurrence of diabetes once every 3 months.
According to these results, vitamin D had no clinically significant effect in preventing the onset of diabetes in adults with high diabetes risk. The diabetes diagnosis rate was 12.5% in the vitamin D group and 14% in the control group, and there was no significant difference. There was no significant difference in the rate at which blood sugar returned to normal levels in the vitamin D group (23%) and the control group (20%).
However, in the small group with insufficient insulin secretion, the effect of vitamin D in preventing diabetes was 59% higher. When all 11 confounding variables that might distort the results, such as age, sex, blood pressure, body mass index (BMI), and family history of diabetes, were taken into consideration, the effect of vitamin D in preventing diabetes was analyzed to be 39% higher.
Meanwhile, the research team said that it is not known whether the dose of active vitamin D selected in this clinical trial was appropriate enough to prevent diabetes, and whether the results might be applied to all other ethnic groups.