Brisk walking better than jogging for diabetes control

21 Jul 2016

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A brisk walk is better than a vigorous jog to stop diabetes, a new study has found.

Cutting calories, eating a low-fat diet, and exercising are known to be the best way to keep diabetes at bay. But many struggle to keep to a diet and the new research showed walking over 11.5 miles or even 7.5 miles a week was better than an 11.5-mile weekly jog

Walking briskly for 11.5 miles a week was the best for improving glucose control in people with pre-diabetes and had nearly four fifths of the effects of the best option.

A 7.5 mile brisk walk was second best and two-and-a-half times better than jogging

Pre-diabetes, also commonly referred to as borderline diabetes, affects around one in three British adults putting them at risk of Type 2 diabetes. The figures are much higher for India, where Type 2 diabetes is common.

It is a growing global problem closely tied to obesity where blood sugar levels are abnormally high, but lower than the threshold for diagnosing diabetes.

An estimated tenth of pre-diabetes patients will go on to get Type 2 in any given year.

The Duke University School of Medicine study followed 150 participants over six months who had been diagnosed with pre-diabetes based on elevated fasting glucose levels.

One group followed the Diabetes Prevention Programme (DPP), considered a gold standard, that aims to achieve a 7 per cent body weight reduction over 6 months.

They changed their diet and did moderate-intensity exercise equivalent to 7.5 miles of brisk walking in a week.

Three other groups did either low amount at moderate intensity exercise equivalent to a 7.5 mile brisk walk, high-amount at moderate intensity exercise equivalent to 11.5 miles brisk walk, and high-amount at vigorous intensity exercise equivalent to jogging for 11.5 miles.

Professor Dr William Kraus in the division of cardiology said, ''We know the benefits of lifestyle changes from the DPP, but it is difficult to get patients to do even one behaviour, not to mention three.

''We wanted to know how much of the effect of the DPP could be accomplished with exercise alone.

''And which intensity of exercise is better for controlling metabolism in individuals at risk for diabetes.''

Those in the DPP group had the greatest benefit, with a nine per cent improvement in oral glucose tolerance - a key measure of how readily the body processes sugar and an indicator used to predict progression to diabetes.

The next best was those in the moderate-intensity 11.5-mile group who saw a seven per cent improvement in glucose tolerance on average.

The moderate-intensity 7.5-mile group had a five per cent improvement on average but the vigorous-intensity 11.5-mile group had only a two per cent average improvement.

Co-author and assistant professor of medicine Dr Cris Slentz added, ''Another way to say it is that a high amount of moderate-intensity exercise alone provided nearly the same benefit on glucose tolerance that we see in the gold standard of fat and calorie restriction along with exercise.''

The findings could be down to the different ways in which high- and moderate-intensity exercise impact the body.

Prof Kraus said: ''High-intensity exercise tends to burn glucose more than fat, while moderate-intensity exercise tends to burn fat more than glucose.

''We believe that one benefit of moderate-intensity exercise is that it burns off fat in the muscles, which relieves the block of glucose uptake by the muscles.

''That's important because muscle is the major place to store glucose after a meal.

''When faced with the decision of trying to do weight loss, diet, and exercise versus exercise alone, the study indicates you can achieve nearly 80 per cent of the effect of doing all three with just a high amount of moderate-intensity exercise.

''I was heartened by the fact that I found out that I can give patients one message and they can get nearly the same effect as when required to exercise, diet and lose weight all at the same time.''

The study was published in the journal Diabetologia.

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