I think that many diabetics do not fully understand just how dangerous the condition is. The level of understanding of how damaging the prediabetic state is for our health is even lower. There are a few important concepts to understand.
First, in the prediabetic state, levels of insulin become elevated. At normal levels, insulin’s actions are required to keep levels of blood glucose optimal in the bloodstream. However, when insulin levels go up because of poor quality lifestyle choices, sedentary lifestyles and environmental chemical exposures, the higher levels of insulin become more dangerous than cigarette smoking.
High blood pressure, abdominal obesity, menstrual problems, most types of cancer, blood clotting problems leading to heart attacks and strokes…the list is almost endless. We live in a society that doesn’t place much concern on being prediabetic unless it means that you can qualify to be put on metformin or some other drug like that.
In the diabetic state, the elevated insulin is still present, but the body can no longer control the levels of glucose so glucose levels elevate in the blood stream. Now we have more problems on top of the insulin issue. Glucose, when levels get high enough, will irreversibly damage proteins in a process called glycation (the Maillard reaction). We check the HbA1c in the bloodstream, which is damage to hemoglobin. But this damage occurs in EVERY cell of the body. Every protein in a diabetics’ body has the potential to being damaged by the elevated glucose. Not good.
Which then brings us to this article. Despite being on diabetic medication, the authors found that the diabetics in this study frequently had elevated levels of blood glucose (hyperglycemia) after meals. This is, for the reason stated above, not good. While the article did not go into detail, it should be obvious that the contents of the meal will play a large role in the body’s response to the meal.
More processed, more unhealthy = less risk of hyperglycemia. This article is the perfect example of why “I have diabetes, but it’s under control with medication” is a very dangerous position to live from. If you are on medication, your condition is NOT, I repeat, NOT, controlled.