Treating pre-diabetes early and aggressively with intensive lifestyle changes or medication could be an effective way to significantly reduce the chances of developing type-2 diabetes later in life.
According to the study published in the British Medical Journal the Lancet, people with pre-diabetes are 56 per cent less likely to develop type-2 diabetes with lifestyle changes. “Studies have shown that diabetes can be prevented or delayed in people with pre-diabetes by diet, physical activity, and various drugs,” said the Lancet.
The WHO estimates that more than 346 million people worldwide have diabetes. Without intervention this number is likely to more than double, and around 470 million people are projected to have pre-diabetes by 2030.
Pre-diabetes is considered a “high-risk state” for developing type-2 diabetes. The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimate one in 10 people with pre-diabetes goes on to develop full-blown diabetes. The new findings suggest that timely interventions, reduces the growth of the diabetes epidemic. The new research is published in the Lancet to concide with the American Diabetes Association meeting taking place in Philadelphia from June 8-12. In the long term research, about 3,000 patients were monitored.
The new findings suggested that the pre-diabetic patients not only progress to full blown diabetes, but glucose levels actually returned to normal at some point during the period they were being followed.
“The results showed that those patients had a 56 per cent reduction in progression to diabetes during 5.7 years of follow up,” added the Lancet.