For the first times since I started this blog 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!
August 1, 2023 saw this statement in the research journal, FRONTIERS IN NUTRITION: “People with type-II diabetes who drank the fermented tea drink kombucha for four weeks had lower fasting blood glucose levels compared to when they consumed a similar-tasting placebo beverage, according to results from a clinical trial conducted by researchers at Georgetown University's School of Health, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and MedStar Health. This finding, from a pilot 12-person feasibility trial, points to the potential for a dietary intervention that could help lower blood sugar levels in people with diabetes and also establishes the basis for a larger trial to confirm and expand upon these results.”
Now, before you run out or do an internet search for your nearest Kombucha supplier, note the sentence: “This finding, [is] from a pilot 12-person feasibility trial”. 
The study went like this: “one group of people [drank] about eight ounces of kombucha or placebo beverage daily for four weeks and then after a two-month period to 'wash out' the biological effects of the beverages, the kombucha and placebo were swapped between groups with another four weeks of drinking the beverages. Neither group was told which drink they were receiving at the time.”
The result was what you read above – six of the twelve people had a significant change in their blood sugars over the period of the test. What is significant? If you test your blood sugars daily as I do now, you know that the “ideal” number on your glucose monitor should be between 70 and 130.
During this test, the group that was drinking the Kombucha tea, 8 ounces every day for the four week study, saw their glucose monitor numbers go from 164 down to 116! Mine this morning was 184.
So…what do YOU suppose I’m going to do?
Well, keep taking my Metformin for one thing. Then it looks like (according to the site that provided the photo, who ranked each of the types of Kombucha drinks, did so based on multiple factors. They also showed how to get hold of the drink, so next time we’re at Target, I’m gonna pick me up some Kombucha bottles and see what all the excitement’s about…
On the other hand, I’m not going to just “drink the Kool-Aid so-to-speak! I’d also like to find out if there’s a LONG-TERM effect, in other words, is there an effect on the subject’s A1c – which we all know is an indicator of long-term changes in the individual’s blood sugar. I already keep track DAILY of my own blood pressure, weight, blood glucose, and one of three: steps, miles biked, or amount of yardwork/snow shoveling. I’ve got a pretty good baseline here (in case you were wondering, I was a science teacher for 41 years; and I continue to teach a science-based class for two or three weeks in the summer called Alien Worlds because I’m both a science fiction writer and I want young people to know that George Lucas created STAR WARS “aliens” by snapping his fingers and saying, “O! wouldn’t it be cool if we had an alien who looked like an easily sympathizable alien who looks like a humanoid Briard (a dog breed) – what did Leia call Chewbacca that one time? Oh, yeah: “Would someone get this walking carpet out of my way?”…(and if you want to learn more about THAT part of me, you can visit my other blogsite, POSSIBLY IRRITATING ESSAYS at https://faithandsciencefiction.blogspot.com/)
Source: THE ACTUAL STUDY (very…sciencey, just so you know!): https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnut.2023.1190248/full
Image: https://sporked.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/RANKING_KOMBUCHA_HEADER-UPDATE.jpg,
https://www.hcd.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/living-well-with-diabetes.jpg
From the first moment I discovered I had been diagnosed with DIABETES, I joined a HUGE “club” that has been rapidly expanding since it stopped being a death sentence in the early 20th 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: STARTING with a 2014 article, “Diabetes – Will it Ever be cured?”; I check up on the various therapies mentioned…This week: Icodec (https://www.utsouthwestern.edu/newsroom/articles/year-2023/july-weekly-insulin-found-safe.html#:~:text=DALLAS%20%E2%80%93%20July%2012%2C%202023%20%E2%80%93,a%20UT%20Southwestern%20Medical%20Center)
In a study published on June 20, 2023 at the Journal of American Medical Association’s website. (The abstract is here: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2806635), doctor Ildiko Lingvay (M.D., M.P.H., M.S.C.S., Professor of Internal Medicine in the Peter O'Donnell Jr. School of Public Health at UT Southwestern) reports the unsurprising fact that more than 37 million Americans are diabetic; but 90%-95% of them have Type 2 diabetes. What means that the body does not respond normally to insulin, causing blood sugar (glucose) to become abnormally high. These levels can lead to long-term complications including heart disease, nerve damage, vision loss, and lower-extremity amputations.
One third of those with Type 2 diabetes require insulin injections to keep their blood sugar within a healthy range. Many of those however, basically refuse to do the injections because of the pain, inconvenience, and the perceived stigma of this treatment. They made a study of an alternative type of the standard insulin delivered in DAILY does – one that only had to be injected ONCE A WEEK!
These once-a-week insulin shots could simplify the future of diabetes treatment, but HOLD ON THERE, BABA LOUIE! Taking a fancy pants shot won’t be all…doctors will instead begin to focus on weight loss! I know! I know! No fancy shot to magically cure our Type 2 diabetes AND melt away that pesky fat so we can go ahead and get back to work, ignoring what we eat and consuming fat, sugar, and whatever ELSE we want to shovel into our mouths without a thought or regret in the world!
We’ve already gotten into deep, deep trouble in that medication created to help Type 2 diabetics live with their condition has been coopted by the immense (number of) people who passionately remember 24-inch waistlines and close their eyes to the 54-inch waistline of their present, bloated self and beg their doctors for The Shot that will melt away the pounds and let them eat whatever the heck they WANT TO without consequence.
There is already a shortage because medications like Ozempic (https://breastcancerreaper.blogspot.com/2023/03/diabetes-research-right-now-3-most.html) are being funneled to a market they were never intended for (or, as my grandchildren like to intone: “Or was it???”)
Back to the end of the study comparing patients who used the usual daily version of insulin called degludec, with the NEW weekly version of insulin called icodec, they noted that “The primary endpoint of the study was a change in a blood measure of longitudinal glucose control, or the patient’s A1C. After 26 weeks of treatment and five weeks of follow-up, patients on weekly icodec had significantly larger improvements in their A1C than those using degludec daily.”
“Both groups had an extremely low rate of adverse events, suggesting that both forms of insulin are safe. Although the patients who received icodec had a slightly higher risk of low-blood sugar events, none of the events were severe enough to require emergency medical attention. The end result appears to be that “patients on icodec stayed in a healthy blood sugar range noticeably more often than patients on degludec…[these] results suggest insulin icodec could be a significant innovation for patients with Type 2 diabetes if it is approved for clinical use. FDA evaluation is the next step.”
NOTE: YOU CAN’T GO ASK FOR THE NEW WEEKLY INSULIN SHOT YET!!!!! It needs to be approved FIRST for clinical use; THEN the FDA has to evaluate it! That means…like years until we even see icodec (with whatever catchy name the FDA and the drug companies decide to advertise it as – maybe something like Weekulin brand weekly Type 2 insulin blood glucose control or SugEven or
Links: (embedded above)
Image: https://asploro.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Diabetes-Research_Open-Access.jpg
