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Considerations For Managing Type 2 Diabetes

If you’ve just gotten the diagnosis of type 2 diagnosis, you may be wondering what’s next—how do you manage such a complex disease? Certainly, your doctor may have prescribed or just recommended that you take a medication for your condition but it is important to remember that medication alone may not be enough to control your blood sugar level. You need to consider other options to help manage this condition.

Weight Considerations

First, what is your weight? Weigh yourself and calculate your body mass index. Here’s how it’s done. Your body mass index or BMI is your weight in pounds divided by your height in inches squared times 703. Ideally, the calculated number should be between 18 and 25. This is considered normal weight. Any number between 25 and 29.9 is considered as overweight and you need to consider losing that weight through diet and exercise. If the BMI is 30 or above, you are considered obese and you would seriously benefit from significant weight loss.

How do you go about losing weight? There are many “fast fixes” and “super pills” on the market that claim fast weight loss, but none has really been proven to be effective or to bring lasting results. You need to resort to old-fashioned diet and exercise forms of weight loss. It’s really the only way that true long-lasting weight loss can happen.

Speak to a nutritionist about what number of calories you need to eat in a given day should be. There is a diet called the “1500 Calorie ADA diet” put out by the American Diabetic Association that can also guide you in the weight loss process. It asks you to keep track of your caloric intake and your carbohydrate intake each day, limiting your caloric intake to 1500 calories and your carbohydrate count to 170-240 grams per day. You can actually count carbs using a carbohydrate-counting book or you can use an exchange list available online or from your doctor. The exchange list gives you food choices based on the number of carbohydrates in the foods. If you follow this diet, you will gradually and safely lose weight.

Diabetes and a Normal Weight

If you have diabetes and you’re not overweight, you should still monitor the amount of sugar you take in each day. Sugar that comes from sweets or table sugar gets into your system very quickly and can cause wide fluctuations in your blood glucose level. Instead, your carbohydrates should be of the complex variety, such as those that come from vegetables, whole fruits, and grains. You should try to have as much fiber in your diet as possible because the fiber will keep sugar in your gut from flooding your bloodstream and will keep your blood sugars more even.

Exercise

Find an exercise program you like and do it regularly. It might be walking, running, cycling, swimming, or any other exercise that gets your heart rate up. This will help with weight loss and promote good cardiovascular health. Remember that diabetics are more prone to develop heart disease so anything you can do to prevent the complications of heart attack or stroke will prolong your life and improve its quality. Aim for at least a half hour a day of exercise 4-7 times per week. Do it with a friend if it gets too boring.

Always consult a physician before starting any exercise program to be sure what is safe for your particular condition and any associated complications you may have.

Medications

For some people, diet and exercise will not be enough to bring the blood sugars into an acceptable range. In such cases, follow your doctor’s advice about taking medications that lower insulin resistance in your body or that help your pancreas work well in response to a sugar load. Metformin is often prescribed by doctors, though other medications are also used. The combination of diet, exercise, and medications should keep your diabetes in check.

Nutrition And Diet

One of the most important considerations in managing type 2 diabetes is making appropriate diet choices, anything that you eat needs to be considered in terms of blood sugar impact. Nutrition therapy is key, as it is food that causes blood sugar spikes and greatly influences blood glucose levels. It is possible to keep those glucose levels stable, and it all begins with meal planning.

Goals Of Nutrition Therapy

The serious complications associated with Type 2 diabetes can be avoided with careful blood sugar management, diet, exercise and weight loss (if needed). Careful monitoring of blood sugars and the condition in general by a medical professional is important since out of control blood sugars can lead to diabetic coma, along with all the other complications.

The goals of nutrition therapy:

According to the American Diabetes Association, the goal of any sound nutritional plan for diabetes is to support and promote healthy eating, with a diet plan that includes a variety of nutrient dense foods in appropriate portion sizes.

Goals Of Nutritional Therapy:

• Reduce the hemoglobin A1C test to less than 7%
• Maintain healthy blood pressure.
• Maintain healthy cholesterol levels.
• Maintain a healthy weight.
• Delay or prevent any possible complications of diabetes.
• Create a personalized diet plan that meets the individual’s personal and cultural circumstances and one that considers the patient’s access to healthy food, and their willingness to make lifestyle changes or else address any barriers to make such changes.
• Enjoy variety in diet and include restrictions only when they are backed by scientific evidence.
• Focus on practical day-to-day meal planning instead of complicated counting of nutrients, carbs, or particular foods.