The Two-Minute Diabetes Q&A
Uncontrolled diabetes doubles your risk of heat disease and shortens life by 10-15 years. Here’s how to know if you're headed for trouble.
Shockingly often, doctors miss opportunities to test people at high risk for diabetes. The result: according to a Centers for Disease Control survey, just 4 percent of people with pre-diabetes have been told by their doctors that they have the condition. And another 5.7 million are living with undiagnosed diabetes.
So grab a pencil--this self-check is easy,but it can find nine out of ten people at risk for dangerous blood sugar problems.
HOME CHECK Circle your answers, then add up the points.
1.How old are you? (Under 40: 0 points; 40-49 1; 50-59: 2; 60 or older: 3)
2.Are you a woman (0) or man (1)?
3.Does a family member (parent, brother, or sister) have diabetes? (No: 0; yes: 1)
4.Do you have high blood pressure or are you on medication for high blood pressure? (No: 0; yes: 1)
5.Are you overweight or obese? (Normal weight: 0; overweight: 1; obese: 2; extremely obese: 3)
6.Are you physically active? (No: 0; yes -1)
YOUR NEXT STEP If your total score is 4 or higher, there’s a good chance you have prediabetes. If it’s 5 or higher, you’re at high risk for diabetes. Weight loss is the most effective preventative treatment. Many of our patients have great success controlling their blood sugars.
Showing posts with label weight loss. Show all posts
Showing posts with label weight loss. Show all posts
Thursday, October 14, 2010
This One Minute Test Could Save Your Life
Measure your Middle
With an oversize waist, your risk of an early death shoots up--even if you aren’t overweight.
A bulging middle is a signal that you have lots of visceral fat, the thick, yellow fat deep in the abdomen that pumps fatty acids, appetite-stimulating hormones, and inflammation-fueling chemicals into the blood stream.
In a recent study of 360,000 people from nine European countries, big waistlines predicted disaster even for people who weren’t overweight--increasing the risk of premature death 79 percent for women and doubling it for men. A big middle is particularly hard on the heart, tripling the risk for fatal heart disease in a Harvard School of Public Health study of 44,636 women.
Even so, experts say doctors frequently fail to measure the waists of normal-weight patients--which means they’re likely to be missing “ab fat” in these otherwise slender patients.
HOME CHECK Bare your torso and stand in front of the mirror. Circle your waist with a tape measure, then move it down until the bottom of the table rests at the top of your hip bones. This is the position recommended by the National Institutes of Health. Don’t hold your breath or cinch the tape too tight. Write down the number.
YOUR NEXT STEP For men, risk for diabetes and heart disease begins to rise with a reading of 37 inches; a measurement of 40 inches and up is considered high risk. For women, 32 inches is the danger threshold, and 35 inches is high-risk terrain. Best ways to shrink visceral fat? Exercise and a Mediterranean-style diet (plenty of produce, grains, fish, and monounsaturated fat from olive oil and nuts). Because visceral fat is more metabolically active than fat on your hips or elsewhere, its actually apt to come off relatively fast as you start to lose weight.
Reader’s Digest, July 2010, 136
With an oversize waist, your risk of an early death shoots up--even if you aren’t overweight.
A bulging middle is a signal that you have lots of visceral fat, the thick, yellow fat deep in the abdomen that pumps fatty acids, appetite-stimulating hormones, and inflammation-fueling chemicals into the blood stream.
In a recent study of 360,000 people from nine European countries, big waistlines predicted disaster even for people who weren’t overweight--increasing the risk of premature death 79 percent for women and doubling it for men. A big middle is particularly hard on the heart, tripling the risk for fatal heart disease in a Harvard School of Public Health study of 44,636 women.
Even so, experts say doctors frequently fail to measure the waists of normal-weight patients--which means they’re likely to be missing “ab fat” in these otherwise slender patients.
HOME CHECK Bare your torso and stand in front of the mirror. Circle your waist with a tape measure, then move it down until the bottom of the table rests at the top of your hip bones. This is the position recommended by the National Institutes of Health. Don’t hold your breath or cinch the tape too tight. Write down the number.
YOUR NEXT STEP For men, risk for diabetes and heart disease begins to rise with a reading of 37 inches; a measurement of 40 inches and up is considered high risk. For women, 32 inches is the danger threshold, and 35 inches is high-risk terrain. Best ways to shrink visceral fat? Exercise and a Mediterranean-style diet (plenty of produce, grains, fish, and monounsaturated fat from olive oil and nuts). Because visceral fat is more metabolically active than fat on your hips or elsewhere, its actually apt to come off relatively fast as you start to lose weight.
Reader’s Digest, July 2010, 136
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