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Type 2 diabetes: NHS to offer 800-calorie diet treatment

bbc.com

111–120 of 208 posts

Re: Type 2 diabetes: NHS to offer 800-calorie diet treatment

#111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nostrums like "treat it like a new lifestyle" are easy to say, but do they actually address the current public health crisis? Proposing actions that, for whatever reason, people don't actually take isn't a useful way to spend time. What's good is what works . And honestly, drugs work today. The likes of the FDA considers them too risky, but I think they're deciding wrong.

>Nostrums def: A medicine >drugs work today .... Seriously though, the problem is that, regardless of cause, we're fat and lazy. Throwing more drugs to take care of diabetes and heart disease is robbing Peter to pay Paul. I'm watching my boomer parents realize that medicine isn't going to help everything, and they are going to have to be accountable for their help. They've gotten much more physically active and lost…

One problem afflicting us now is that people eat too much, consequently weigh too much, damage their health, and balloon healthcare expenses society-wide. If a pill can make people eat less, why reject it? If a medication solves a problem, it solves a problem. You can't say "X doesn't work" when X does, in fact, work, and then expect people to take you seriously.

You're adopting a moralizing stance here, one that says that gain without pain is illegitimate. This approach has broad appeal, but it just doesn't work. For decades people have been making the same argument you're making, and it hasn't worked. It's time we try something else.

Re: Type 2 diabetes: NHS to offer 800-calorie diet treatment

#112
post #6
post #3

Losing a lot of weight with very low calorie diets is hard, but not regaining it over the next couple of years is next to impossible. Your body will try all the tricks in the book, it will reduce your metabolism to way below that of the person of the same weight, it will amp up your hunger hormones so much that you will think and dream about food 24/7. Only 5 to 7% of people that lose a large amount weight are able t…

>Only 5 to 7% of people that lose a large amount weight are able to keep it off successfully in the medium and long term. Hope there is more research into this mechanism. Are there any studies in this area I can read that discuss the figures you've mentioned?

I referenced some things in this comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18571376

Re: Type 2 diabetes: NHS to offer 800-calorie diet treatment

#113
post #96

The 800 calories they are eating doesn't seem terribly healthy: "patients were asked to follow either a ‘home-made’ milk- and fruit-juice-based diet (811 kcal/day, 64 g protein, 132 g carbohydrate, 6 g fat) with a multivitamin/mineral supplement (Forceval® [Alliance]), or a micronutrient-replete commercial LELD (832 kcal/day, 87 g protein, 120 g carbohydrate, 12 g fat). I imagine these people are probably staving...…

It's going to be extremely difficult to confirm to 800 calories consisting almost entirely of carbs - very few people are going to succeed with this.

Neither of those consist almost entirely of carbs.

Re: Type 2 diabetes: NHS to offer 800-calorie diet treatment

#115
post #16

When I was first diagnosed with T2 I did some reading around. Interesting history, especially pre- manufactured insulin. For example, war is "good" for reducing incidence of diabetes, because famine.

Two minor points: T2 isn’t controlled with insulin; it’s a syndrome of insulin resistance and other metabolic dysfunctions. And “manufactured insulin” came on the scene in 1922. Before that, T1 diabetes was universally fatal.

My T2 is not treated with insulin today, but it could be later if it gets worse. And I am indeed talking about history pre-20th century.

For example, diabetes used to be diagnosed by peeing on the ground and seeing if ants we attracted to it. According to whatever diabetes history book I checked out of a medical library on inter library loan.

Re: Type 2 diabetes: NHS to offer 800-calorie diet treatment

#116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Nostrums def: A medicine >drugs work today .... Seriously though, the problem is that, regardless of cause, we're fat and lazy. Throwing more drugs to take care of diabetes and heart disease is robbing Peter to pay Paul. I'm watching my boomer parents realize that medicine isn't going to help everything, and they are going to have to be accountable for their help. They've gotten much more physically active and lost…

One problem afflicting us now is that people eat too much, consequently weigh too much, damage their health, and balloon healthcare expenses society-wide. If a pill can make people eat less, why reject it? If a medication solves a problem, it solves a problem. You can't say "X doesn't work" when X does, in fact, work, and then expect people to take you seriously. You're adopting a moralizing stance here, one that say…

> You can't say "X doesn't work" when X does, in fact, work, and then expect people to take you seriously. > You're adopting a moralizing stance here, one that says that gain without pain is illegitimate.

No, I'm saying that a pill won't solve the root problem. You make people skinny with a pill, you just end up with unhealthy, malnourished skinny people who insulin is all out of wack and who will still get heart attacks.

> For decades people have been making the same argument you're making, and it hasn't worked. It's time we try something else.

Are you suggesting that "throw a pill at it" hasn't been a solution for decades? We've had this belief that medical science can cure us of all our ills, and I think we are no realizing we can't. I've seen family members become shells of themselves after surgery after surgery causes them to lose as much as they got back. Pills always have trade offs, surgery always leaves scars. Maybe one day that'll be the case where a pill will solve all our problems, but it's not today.

Re: Type 2 diabetes: NHS to offer 800-calorie diet treatment

#117
post #92

About 3 years ago (late 2015 now) I was quite overweight, had a knee injury that limited my mobility (stairs mostly) and had a fasting glucose and post-meal readings that indicated I was nearly pre-diabetic (T2). So, I cut out out all sugary drinks, refined carbs, late night eating (!!) and tried various intermittent fasting / time restricted feeding techniques (5:2, alternate day, one-meal-a-day) and after about 3.5…

Congrats! What fasting method do you currently use, or do you switch between the ones listed?

Re: Type 2 diabetes: NHS to offer 800-calorie diet treatment

#118
Loving the broscience takedowns of this NHS pilot program about how "this won't work!", or "low carb / keto is the best way!"

If only doctors knew how to read internet forums, then they'd be as knowledgable as all the armchair docs here, few (none?) of whom seem to have any actual training or T2 diabetes themselves.

Re: Type 2 diabetes: NHS to offer 800-calorie diet treatment

#119

When people will realize that carbs are the only non-essential macronutrient? The sports community (especially bodybuilding) knows that for decades. If an athlete says to me that a thing he does to his body work 95% of the time, I would consider to try it, and already did, some things against over-the-counter conventional medicine like this no-carb diet.

The endurance sports community relies heavily on carbs, to the extent of often consuming sugar supplements during races and longer training sessions. Sure there are some endurance athletes who follow low-carb or even ketogenic diets, but they generally aren't able to compete at elite levels due to lower metabolic efficiency.
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