Type 2 diabetes is due to a relative lack of insulin effect, which is often connected to an individuals weight. We all know that being overweight is a risk for developing diabetes and that losing weight, therefore, should prevent the development of diabetes.
In a large study from Sweden, recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine, patients who were markedly overweight (BMI=40 or greater) had a reduced risk of diabetes when they had surgery for weight loss.
The 45 pounds of weight lost by the average surgical patient (either banding procedure or full gastric bypass) resulted in a 90% reduction of diabetes compared to ‘standard care’ for obese patients.
This result is touted as a major ‘advance’ in our understanding of diabetes, but really it just confirms what we already presume to know…..increased obesity is linked with diabetes and weight loss is linked with it’s prevention.
Read more at
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1112082?query=featured_home