Massachusetts General Hospital researcher Jose C. Florez, MD, PhD, and colleagues did genetic tests on 3,548 study participants. They looked for TCF7L2 gene variants recently linked to type 2 diabetes. They found that 1 in 10 of those with high blood sugar had two copies of the diabetes genes, and 4 in 10 had one copy. Study participants with two copies of the diabetes gene had an 81 percent increased risk of type 2 diabetes.
However, the study also showed that a person can greatly reduce that risk through diet and lifestyle change. Study participants were able to lower their risk of type 2 diabetes if they lost 5 to 7 percent of their body weight and exercised 30 minutes, five days a week.
"Even the participants at highest genetic risk benefited from healthy lifestyle changes as much as, or perhaps more than, those who did not inherit the variant," Florez said in a news release. "People at risk of diabetes, whether they're overweight, have elevated blood glucose levels, or have this particular gene variant, can benefit greatly by implementing a healthy lifestyle."
Additional diabetic resources:
No comments:
Post a Comment