DIABETES RESEARCH RIGHT NOW! #1: DIABETES RESEARCH RIGHT NOW!

From the first moment I discovered I had been diagnosed with DIABETES, I joined a HUGE  “club” that has been rapidly expanding since t stopped being a death sentence in the early 20^th Century. Currently, there are about HALF A BILLION PEOPLE who have Type 2 Diabetes. For the past 3500 years – dating back to Ancient Egypt – people have suffered from diabetes. Well, I’m one of them now… Not one to shut up for any known reason, I added a section to this blog…

Every month, I’ll be highlighting Diabetes research that is going on RIGHT NOW! Harvested from different websites, journals and podcasts, I’ll translate them into understandable English and share them with you. Today:

Oddly, a study out of the Technical University of Munich, this month on the ScienceDaily website connects both Diabetes and Alzheimer’s…

In Alzheimer's disease, the degeneration of brain cells is linked to formation of toxic protein aggregates and deposits known as amyloid plaques. Similar processes play an important role also in type 2 diabetes. A research team has now developed 'mini-proteins', so-called peptides, which are able to bind the proteins that form amyloids and prevent their aggregation into cytotoxic amyloids.”

What’s that mean in plain English?

 I’ve written about plaques and tangles in the past in Alzheimer’s posts (for example, here: https://breastcancerreaper.blogspot.com/2021/11/alzheimers-research-right-now-16-cause.html). Research is ongoing to discover how this incredibly complex organ we call “the brain” is affected by Alzheimer’s. Plaques are weird clusters of broken protein pieces. They get stuck between nerve cells which slows down how quickly – or even WHETHER – nerve cells can communicate with each other. If they can’t communicate, the person loses memories, the ability to know what to do in certain situations, sometimes even the ability to walk, drink, or even feed themselves. Disconnected from each other, the nerve cells eventually start to die. Dead and dying nerve cells contain tangles, which are made up of twisted strands of another protein. Quite simply, the brain slowly becomes a train wreck of broken pieces of proteins that cut off and clog communication between the cells.

 Now it appears that the formations of these same proteins mess with our bodies and interfere with the use and transport of insulin – the molecule that takes the simple sugar that comes from your body breaking down stuff like hamburgers, potato chips, and mini-donuts into the tiny, tiny sugar called glucose – the simplest sugar that you can have and still call it “sugar”. It also happens to be the ONLY sugar your body can use to run itself.

 So – HOW do these plaques and tangles that gum up the brain’s ability to think and remember wreck our body’s ability to use insulin properly? Insulin is supposed to allow the cells of the body to take glucose from the blood.

SO?

 “Insulin controls the breakdown of carbs, fat, and protein by boosting glucose from the blood into liver, fat. and muscle cells. The glucose is changed into either glycogen or fat. The liver actually does both. Both glycogen and fat store energy this way. The liver won’t make glucose or release it into the blood when there’re too much insulin in the blood. The same insulin also messes with making protein ALL OVER THE BODY. Low levels of insulin have the opposite effect – it makes the body STOP making glucose. And glucose is what makes your body work – muscles, blood cells, antibody cells, brain cells, nerve cells…so insulin HAS to be balanced or else it screws up the functions of the body.”

 Now you have the background to read WHAT this means for Type 2 Diabetics AND Alzheimer’s patients. Before I go any farther, let me point out that these plaques and tangles, once they begin to clump and form “blobs”, kill individual cells – it’s called being cyto (cell) toxic (deadly), or cytotoxic.

 “The team invented artificial peptides (which are like, “building blocks” of everything your body is made of.) These artificial peptides STOP the clumping of plaques and tangles. Dr. Kapurniotu notes, ‘The designed peptides look very similar to harmful clumps and tangles, but don’t have the cytotoxic effects! In fact, white blood cells go after them even MORE that the ones what make up the plaques and tangles!’”

 There’s no “magic bullet” right now to cure diabetes (or Alzheimer’s), but it seems that based on this research, that there MIGHT be something that can manage both diseases…and that will help an incredible number of people…

A Concise History of Diabetes: https://www.everydayhealth.com/diabetes/understanding/diabetes-mellitus-through-time.aspx

Resources: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/11/221109085759.htm

Image: https://asploro.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Diabetes-Research_Open-Access.jpg

GUY’S GOTTA TALK ABOUT…DIABETES #3: What Is Blood Sugar and What Does It RESPOND To??? PART 1

For the first times since I started this column eleven years ago, it’s going to be about me. I was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes two weeks ago. While people are happy to talk about their experiences with diabetes, I WASN’T comfortable with talking about diabetes. My wife is Type 2, as are several friends of ours. The “other Type” of diabetes was what caused the death of my Best Man a year after my wife and I got married. He was diagnosed with diabetes when he was a kid. It was called Juvenile Diabetes then. Today it’s Type 1. Since then, I haven’t WANTED to talk about diabetes at all. But…for my own education and maybe helping someone else, and not one to shut up for any known reason, I’m reopening my blog rather than starting a new one. I MAY take a pause and write about Breast Cancer or Alzheimer’s as medical headlines dictate; but this time I’m going to drag anyone along who wants to join my HIGHLY RELUCTANT journey toward better understanding of my life with Type 2 Diabetes. You’re Welcome to join me!

I was going to do something different, but I think I’m going to go after something incredibly perplexing to me…

So, after my visit with a Diabetes Educator, I got my monitor and have embarked on the diabetic adventure of poking myself with a sharp needle, bleeding and then “taking my blood sugar” at least once a day. Below, you’ll see a picture of the results:



Since I started doing the finger prick thing, I’ve gotten readings that range from 110 to 218. I know what the number MEANS (it’s bad because it’s lit up red on the monitor. It’s good if it’s green…) but apparently it depends also on the time of day, what you’ve eaten, and how much you’ve moved. So, I’m going to dig into it here, starting with the foundation and I’m personalizing it so my HEAD gets it:

“Insulin is a key player in developing type 2 diabetes…it regulates glucose in my body…Here are the high points:

The food I eat is broken down into glucose that enters my bloodstream. That happens in everyone all the time. That tells the pancreas to release insulin, which enters cells commanding them to use the glucose. Insulin signals the liver to store glucose. As the level of glucose in my blood goes down, the amount of insulin goes down, too. When the insulin levels go too far down, it alerts the liver to release stored glucose, so even if I haven’t eaten for a while, I don’t pass out from my cells starving. That’s when everything works smoothly.

My body is…I’d like to use a stronger expletive, but I’m trying to keep my blog G-Rated, so I’ll say…messed up. So, I go to the Minnesota State Fair and do what I’ve always done: “It’s fine! I only do this once a year! I’m walking a lot today! I’ll be fine!” Lots of glucose enters my bloodstream. My pancreas pumps out more insulin to get glucose into cells. After a while, my cells stop sucking in glucose. My pancreas releases MORE insulin, trying to force my cells to pick up more glucose. My pancreas can’t keep up, and the levels of glucose in my blood keep rising. The insulin is ALSO telling my liver and muscles to store glucose. When they’re stuffed full, my liver sends the glucose to FAT cells to be stored as (to be frank) FLAB. I’ve become insulin resistant, the new term is that I have impaired insulin sensitivity.

So, there’s glucose in my blood that should be going into my muscle cells, which gets shunted to FAT cells.

I got it.

Next, how much glucose is supposed to be in my blood? Well a fairly intensive search on the internet only cleared THAT question up enough to say, “It all depends”… There are a number of charts that show me what the “right amount of glucose in my blood should be”. I’m going to reference this one until/unless my doctor directs me to another one:

https://assets-global.website-files.com/622154d5a1d5c02e596f4511/62f2bee4de0117f1ec10c745_BloodGlucoseChart.jpeg

This might be old (2019), but it’s a really good summary of what I SHOULD be doing. I’ll dive into it in my next post: https://diabetes.org/sites/default/files/2019-10/ADV_2019_Consumer_Nutrition_One%20Pager.pdf

So, farewell for the next two weeks. I’ll be posting again on November 27 – appropriately three days after Thanksgiving!

Resource: https://diabetes.org/, (for a MUCH deeper look at several studies that used constant glucose monitoring to track data, go here: https://www.levelshealth.com/blog/what-should-my-glucose-levels-be-ultimate-guide#:~:text=Summary%20Of%20Normal%20Glucose%20Ranges&text=Glucose%20levels%20between%2070%2D120,of%2081%2D102%20mg%2Fdl), “Nutrition Therapy” sounds fancy, but in the end, it means “eating right” https://diabetesjournals.org/care/article/42/5/731/40480/Nutrition-Therapy-for-Adults-With-Diabetes-or

Image: https://www.hcd.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/living-well-with-diabetes.jpg