diabetes Archives - Dedham Health

Treating Diabetes – What comes first, lifestyle or medication?

February 5, 2019 By hailley

Dedham Health & Athletic Complex offers a monthly Diabetes Forum & Support Group meeting. It is held on the 3^rd Wednesday of each month from 10:00 – 11: 00 am in the Dedham Health Theater.

This is FREE and open to everyone in the community. Join us to learn and discuss topics related to prediabetes, diabetes and healthier lifestyle choices.

The group is led by Cathy Mullooly, MS, CEP, CDE. Contact her at cathy@dedhamhealth.com with any questions or for more information.

July 2018 topic: Treating Diabetes – What comes first, lifestyle or medication?

Managing prediabetes and diabetes involves a combination of exercise, diet, and prescription medications. How much and when they work depend on many different factors.

In the first few years after being diagnosed with prediabetes, exercise and weight loss can delay or prevent type 2 diabetes.

Once diabetes has been diagnosed, exercise and diet continue to play important roles.

A prescription medication may be needed to meet blood sugar goals.

However, with all of these options, it can get confusing. How much exercise do you need to do?

What foods can you eat? Why do you need to start a new diabetes medication? How do all of these things affect your blood sugar?

During this meeting, the Diabetes Forum and Support Group learned about the natural history of type 2 diabetes and the different stages of type 1 diabetes.

They also learned how medications work on different organs in the body to improve blood sugar levels. Then they discussed how to eat better, exercise regularly, and take their medications correctly.

-Cathy M., MS, CEP, CDE

Exercise – Why and How to Make it Happen

February 5, 2019 By hailley

Dedham Health & Athletic Complex offers a monthly Diabetes Forum & Support Group meeting. It is held on the 3^rd Wednesday of each month from 10:00 – 11: 00 am in the Dedham Health Theater.

This is FREE and open to everyone in the community. Join us to learn and discuss topics related to prediabetes, diabetes, and healthier lifestyle choices.

The group is led by Cathy Mullooly, MS, CEP, CDE. Contact her at cathy@dedhamhealth.com with any questions or for more information.

June 2018 topic: Exercise – Why and How to Make it Happen

Exercise is one of the cornerstones of diabetes care. It is well known that being physically active helps everyone stay healthier. For people with prediabetes or diabetes, it helps them manage blood sugars and weight.

However, it can also be difficult for anyone to start and stick to an exercise program. And once you get started it can be confusing.

Where do you start? How much time do you really need to spend? What really counts as exercise?

If you have diabetes, what should you expect from your blood sugar readings? If you want to lose weight, what should you expect to see on the scale?

During this meeting, the Diabetes Forum and Support Group identified some of the common barriers to exercise. They then discussed different strategies and how to plan to be successful in sticking to an exercise program.

Try it for yourself. Click here and take “The Barriers to Being Active Quiz” to see what gets in your way.

-Cathy M., MS, CEP, CDE

November is National Diabetes Month

October 29, 2018 By hailley

A lot of diabetes information is shared during the month of November. The yearly American Diabetes Association campaign raises awareness about diabetes and encourages people to make healthy changes. The message must be getting through because people with diabetes are living longer and healthier than ever before!

This does not mean that managing diabetes is easy. It takes hard work for each person to predict how food, exercise, and stress will affect their blood sugar readings. And most of this work goes unseen and unappreciated by those around them as many family members and friends misunderstand the basics.

Even so, people with diabetes are succeeding in the management of their disease and leading successful careers. There are long lists of performers, business leaders, scientists, etc. that have been diagnosed with diabetes. Below is a selected list of modern athletes who have juggled type 1 diabetes while performing at the top of their sport:

Scott Verplank – started playing professional golf in 1986. Now on the Champions Tour.
Michelle McGann – became an LPGA tour member in 1989. Now on the Legends Tour.
Gary Hall – won a total of 10 Olympic medals as a swimmer in the 1996, 2000 and 2004 games.
Barbara Jardin – retired from swimming in 2016. Swam for Canada in the 2012 Olympic Games.
Jay Cutler – played 12 seasons as an NFL Quarterback between 2006 and 2016.
Missy Foy – world ranked elite marathon runner. Qualified for Olympics in 2000.
Mark Lowe – professional baseball pitcher. 2018 marked his 12^th season.
Sara Groenewegen – a pitcher for the Canadian Women’s National Softball team since 2013.
Will Cross – mountain climber who ascended highest peaks on all 7 continents
Zippora Karz – soloist ballerina with the New York City Ballet from 1983 – 1999.

If you know someone with diabetes, take a minute to show encouragement and to recognize all that they do to take care of themselves! And if you want to learn more about diabetes, check out useful information on the Dedham Diabetes website.

-Cathy M., Diabetes and Exercise Consultant at Dedham Health

Diabetes Prevention is in the Air!

March 20, 2018 By hailley

This Spring, qualified Medicare members will have a new benefit available to them. For the first time ever, the cost of attending a program that may help to prevent or delay type 2 diabetes will be covered.

Programs to prevent diabetes have been around for many years. And they have been very successful for most people. Now, expanded coverage will allow more people to attend a 16 week Medicare Diabetes Prevention Program near them. The coverage change starts on April 1, 2018.

To qualify, you have to meet one of these two categories:

1. Be at least 18 years old AND

Be overweight (body mass index ≥25; ≥23 if Asian) AND
Have no previous diagnosis of type 1 or type 2 diabetes AND
Have a blood test result in the prediabetes range within the past year:
- Hemoglobin A1C: 5.7%–6.4% OR
- Fasting plasma glucose: 100–125 mg/dL OR
- Two-hour plasma glucose: 140–199 mg/dL

2. Be previously diagnosed with gestational diabetes

If this sounds like you, ask your health care provider to refer you to a program. You can find programs in your area at: www.cdc.gov/diabetes/prevention

And remember, DHAC understands how to be on your team. We have helped hundreds of people learn to live well with diabetes and prediabetes. Learn how we can help you at dedhamhealthdiabetes.com!

-Cathy M., Diabetes and Exercise Consultant at Dedham Health

Diabetes Alert Day: What Does Your BMI Have to Do With It?

March 19, 2018 By hailley

If you have read anything about being healthy, you have probably come across a short series of letters – BMI. This stands for Body Mass Index. But how is it calculated? What is it? What does it mean for you? Because Diabetes Alert Day is almost here, we are going to focus on the link between the BMI and type 2 diabetes.

First of all, the BMI is calculated using a formula based on your height and weight. A quick search of the internet will yield calculators to do the work for you. If you are curious about your BMI, here is one to try: NIH

Then what is it? Simply put, your height does not change much as an adult. However, as you gain or lose weight over the years, this means that you have more or less volume (mass) on your body. Studies show that the higher the BMI, the higher the risk for certain diseases. However, this formula does not take into account other important factors about your weight. Such as, how much fat is on your body? And where is that fat stored? In the belly? On the hips? Or how much lean muscle do you have? All of these factors influence your risk of disease.

The BMI is very useful when looking at trends and changes in large populations. For example, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reported that in 2016 38% of US adults met the BMI criteria for obesity. This is a dramatic change from 1990 when only 11% of the adult population met this criteria. Over this same time period, the percentage of people diagnosed with diabetes has increased from 2.5% to 9.4%. Based on this type of data, we have a better understanding of how obesity and type 2 diabetes are connected.

So, what does your BMI result mean for you? Your BMI will let you know which broad criteria you meet – underweight, normal, overweight or obese. But this does not tell you enough about your personal health risk. What you need to do is measure your waist. Fat stored in the belly causes insulin resistance. If you are a male, your waist should measure less than 40 inches. If you are a female, this measure should be less than 35 inches. If it is over, your risk for type 2 diabetes is greater.

One other option is to have your fat mass measured. This is also called your body composition. There are different ways that this can be done. Underwater weighing, air displacement and X-ray systems are very accurate but are not always an option. Skin calipers can be used to measure the thickness of fat layers on certain areas of the body. The easiest are scales that measure the flow of a small electric current as it runs through the body. All of these will provide you with the percentage of fat versus fat-free weight. For example, a person who weighs 200 pounds and has 20% body fat has 40 pounds of fat stored. This leave 160 pounds of bone, organs, muscle, water and connective tissue.

If you know, or want to have your body fat percentage measured, remember that some fat is essential for health and women have a biological need to store more fat than men. This is why the obesity criteria for women is a fat percentage over 32% and for men it is over 26%.

As you consider the options and what they mean for you, it should be clear that there is a connection between obesity and type 2 diabetes. And if you have diabetes, you will probably not be surprised to learn that A1c values trend higher in people who have higher body fat percentages.

Think about all of this on Tuesday, March 27. This is the date for 2018’s Diabetes Alert Day. On this day, events will be held around the country to inform Americans about type 2 diabetes.

And don’t forget to consider how DHAC can help you change things around. Each member of our Exercise Physiology staff holds a college degree in Exercise Science. You will find that their expertise and commitment will help you develop a safe and effective approach to exercise for diabetes and weight control. For more information, visit our website, here.

-Cathy M., Diabetes and Exercise Consultant at Dedham Health