High intensity exercise benefits diabetics –Study

High intensity  exercise helps improve sugar regulation and belly fat in diabetics among other benefits, according to a study published in the scientific journal PLOS ONE. The study results showed that when a group of type-2 diabetic patients took part in an eight week program of high-intensity training three times a week, they experienced improved […]

High intensity  exercise helps improve sugar regulation and belly fat in diabetics among other benefits, according to a study published in the scientific journal PLOS ONE.

The study results showed that when a group of type-2 diabetic patients took part in an eight week program of high-intensity training three times a week, they experienced improved glucose tolerance, a huge reduction in their abdominal fat, and more active beta cells that make insulin in the pancreas.

According to Per Bendix Jeppesen a co-author of the study from the Department of Clinical Medicine at Aarhus University, the researchers found  extremely large effects on a whole range of problems associated with diabetes. 

“It‘s a pioneering study of a form of exercise that people actually find time to do. We could hardly recognise them when they came to be measured the final time. Their fat distribution was quite different. One of the participants had lost 1.6 kilograms of belly fat in just eight weeks,” he said.

Jeppesen said that no medicine provides the same powerful effect.

The researchers recruited 10 type-2 diabetics aged 56 to 58. They were all overweight with a BMI greater than 30 and did no regular exercise. They also selected 13 non-diabetic individuals, who otherwise had the same characteristics as the diabetic group, including age, weight, and level of physical inactivity.

The scientists had measured participants’ glucose tolerance before the study started, the efficiency of their insulin-producing cells, and their abdominal fat.

Participants met at the gym three times a week, where they completed ten minutes of high intensity exercise – one-minute cycling and one-minute rest, repeated 10 times.

Lead author, Søren Møller Madsen, from the Department of Clinical Medicine at Aarhus University, Denmark,  said it is something that one  can do at home adding that “it takes half an hour, three times a week, so it’s manageable for most people.” 

Each practice session lasted 30 minutes, including warm up and cool down. During the rest intervals, participants could either rest completely or continue cycling at a low speed.

After eight weeks of training, they re-measured the participants’ belly fat, alpha cell activity, and sugar tolerance.

The diabetic group had lost on average 18 per cent of belly fat, while the healthy group had lost 10 per cent. Belly fat is considered dangerous as it often leads to cardiovascular problems, which indicates that there is fat around the internal organs such as the liver and kidneys.

Mathias Reid-Larsen, postdoc at the National Centre for Health at the National Hospital, Denmark, said this form of exercise could be accessible to people with weight problems that may not otherwise take part in exercise, as well as diabetic patients.

All participants took part in the training until the end-despite the fact that it was very strenuous.