Walks after meals may help manage diabetes
LONDON: Taking a 10-minute stroll after each meal could help sufferers of type two diabetes control their condition, experts have found.
Patients who exercised three times a day, after breakfast, lunch and dinner, had lower blood sugar levels than those who went for a single 30-minute walk daily.
Those with type two diabetes are encouraged to exercise regularly, but not advised about when to do this. The researchers, whose results were published in the Diabetologia medical journal, called for a change in the guidelines.
After testing 41 volunteers, they found that those who took regular exercise within five minutes of finishing meals saw their blood sugar drop 22 percent immediately after the walk, and 12 percent lower overall, than people who went for one walk a day.
The scientists, from Otago University in New Zealand, wrote that although the total walking time was the same, “advice to walk after each main meal resulted in significantly greater overall activity”. Previous research suggests muscular contractions shortly after eating help transport the newly digested glucose into cells without insulin.
Type two diabetes sufferers do not make enough insulin to control blood sugar levels, or the body’s cells do not react properly to the hormone.
A second study, in the same journal, suggests regular exercise by healthy people significantly reduces the chance that they will develop type two diabetes. Researchers from Cambridge University and Uni- versity College London (UCL) found walking for 30 minutes a day, five times a week, resulted in a 26 percent lower risk.
An hour of exercise daily reduced the risk by 40 percent, independent of diet.
Andrea Smith, of UCL and Cambridge, said: “Our results suggest a major potential for physical activity to slow down or reverse the global increase in type two diabetes.” – Daily Mail