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Many old timers, from the early days at diabetes.co.uk, will remember the resident dietition. A vehement lowcarb anti who never let an opportunity pass to issue health warnings. Scurvy, osteoporosis, constipation was on the cards for us, and that was only the more mild ailments. She fooled no one other than newbie’s and a few forum moderators and their statin impaired butt licking clique. What was doubly worrying, was the fact the dietition was also a Director of BDA. The dietition had no idea how to control type two diabetes, I often wondered if she knew anything at all. It was beyond her understanding the huge difference it made as to where our 30-50 carbs per day came from.
Both pictures contain 30 grams of carbs – a daily intake while eating moderately strict LCHF. Which would you choose? In other words: avoid the major sources of carbs (sweets, bread, pasta, rice and potatoes). Then you can enjoy plenty of other good food and still get a good effect on your weight and health.
Many of us lowcarbers have dropped the high starch bun, and replaced it with the foods shown in the first photograph, and dietitions wonder why we think most of them are useless and not fit for purpose.
There is a faint glimmer of hope on the horizon, from one NHS dietition who posts on the great Dr. John Briffa blog and says.
"I am a Dietitian working in the NHS. It horrifies me to think that so many people no longer trust the medical and lifestyle advice they receive from their Health Care Professionals. Have we become so blinkered that we fall for the pharmaceutical research strap lines hook, line and sinker? Why do we repeat the mantra all advice we give must be 'evidence based' when there is so much conflicting 'evidence', lack of research on nutrition (you cant patent a natural product!), questionable outcomes, and definitely no 'one size fits all' approach to patient treatment. We actually know so little about the genetics of Type 2 Diabetes, it is becoming clear that the label 'Type 2' could cover any number of genetic differences that cause issues with glucose metabolism."
An image widely shared on Twitter showing a still from the BBC coverage of the funeral, with tears flowing down the cheeks of George Osborne during the Bishop of London's Address.
As George Osborne wept through the service of the despotic ex dictator, I wondered how many tears he has shed for the countless disabled people his cuts have effected. So devastated are many genuinely disabled people suicide is increasing. Unemployment figures released today show a sharp increase. “UK unemployment rise adds to pressure on Osborne's austerity strategy. Unemployment reaches 2.56 million as another 20,000 under-25s add their names to the register. Pay rises registered the lowest increase since 2001” The Guardian. Tesco report first losses in 20 years. Take it from me when Tesco makes a loss the economy is close to skid row. There is no company more ruthless and penny pinching than Tesco. When Tesco is struggling most other retail businesses are having the last rites read. Meanwhile there is outrage over findings that RWE npower and others have paid little or no corporation tax despite significant profits.
“RWE npower, with 6.6 million customers, paid no corporation tax between 2009 and 2011, while Scottish Power paid only £102m in 2012 on profits of £1.2bn – even though the lowest corporate tax rate is 20%. German-owned E.ON paid only £532m in corporation tax between 2007 and 2011 on pre-tax profits of nearly £5bn. French-owned EDF paid "over £200m" last year on pre-tax profits of £1.7bn.
The figures are difficult to obtain as most of the companies are subsidiaries of foreign multinationals, and only emerged when Labour's Caroline Flint, the shadow energy secretary, approached each company directly. They have inflamed the public debate on fuel prices at a time when public trust in energy suppliers is at rock bottom”
As millions are spent on the funeral to be seen at, The Daily Mail reports today.
“Elderly patients are being shunted between hospital wards ‘like parcels’ because of a shortage of beds, say doctors who have warned the current system is on 'the brink of collapse'.
Frail patients are frequently woken up in the night and made to walk to another department in their pyjamas because someone else needs their bed, a damning report has found.
On occasions, they are also being discharged in the middle of the night and sent home in taxis just to make space on wards.
The Royal College of Physicians president, Sir Richard Thompson, said patients were being passed around ‘like parcels’ and ‘dominoes’. He added: ‘This is no way to run a health service. One doctor told me his trust does not function well at night or at the weekend and he is “relieved” that nothing catastrophic has happened when he arrives at work on Monday morning. Excellent care must be available to patients at all times of the day and night.”
Quote of the day.
Cameron insisted “we are all Thatcherites now” and paid tribute to her impact on public life ahead of the former Prime Minister’s ceremonial funeral today. The Independent
Still with me ? Thank you I will conclude. What the Thatcherites have done for our nation. They have made it a place where dishonesty, corruption and greed is not only accepted it is applauded. While MP’s still refuse to report their expenses fully, the Banks still rob the people, the NHS is being destroyed as MP’s pile their ill gotten gains into private healthcare. The poor and disabled, the old and the sick, struggle to heat their homes, while the utility companies make billions in profits and pay little or no tax. Unemployment goes up, while some of our best young people leave University to work in a fast food joint on minimal wage. Our best in the world armed forces return from fighting a war, to be chucked on the dole, and rely on charity to repair their smashed bodies and minds. Last word to Gordon Gekko from the film Wall Street sums up Thatcher and Thatcherism perfectly.
“The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit.”
If I was asked to name the most hated woman in my lifetime a few weeks ago, I would have said Myra Hindley and I would have been wrong. Hindley was a convicted serial murderer and torturer of children, the other half of the infamous killer duo Brady and Hindley. While Brady rots inside never to be released, Hindley died some years ago in prison. Very few if any were sorry to see her passing, but the event was no big deal.
Counter that with the joy across the nation on hearing Thatcher had died. Sure the media and the Tory party are working overtime to tell us what a wonderful person she was, and how she saved the nation, the Tories need all the spin it can get these days, anything to divert attention from the big agenda. And the big agenda ? the UK is going down the tubes fast, and Thatcher and her ilk, started the decline, with the massive destruction of our major industries. Let’s not forget, while the Tories are painting her in glowing colours, she was not voted out, her own party began to realise she was a big liability and stabbed her in the back.
So, tomorrow she will be accorded a funeral for a hero, no doubt people who never knew her, not even born during her years at the helm, will weep openly on the streets. The great and the good will turn up for the service, people who stabbed her in the back, people who detested her, they will all be there. It will be a beautifully choreographed event, because no one, absolutely no one, does bullshit as good as the Brits.
May the Iron Lady rust in peace.
Eddie
THATCHER DESTROYS THE UK MINING INDUSTRY
The government, tightly observing the contingency methods suggested in
the 1974 report into nationalised industries known as the Ridley Plan in
the event of a strike, mobilised tens of thousands of police who were
drafted in from all over the country. While their official role during
the strike was to 'employ riot tactics in order to uphold the law
against violent picketing', they often initiated unprovoked baton
charges against pickets, such as happened at the much publicised
'Battle of Orgreave' and such that are widely believed to have caused
the deaths of pickets David Jones and Joe Green. Three children also
died during the strike, from picking coal in the winter. Members of the
British Army are also widely believed by miners to have been present at
the picket lines, and there exists film footage of 'policemen' wearing
tunics missing any identifying numbers on their lapels.
Communities had been devastated and left to rot, receiving not an ounce
of help from the government that had wielded the sword that had cut the
very lifeline that the communities had depended on, the coal pits.
Throughout the second half of the 1980s Thatcher continued her policy of
de-industrialisation in favour of imports from abroad, effectively
destroying British industry at the cost of thousands of jobs, with
unemployment reaching over 11% in the UK and about 50% in mining
communities by the late 80s. The potential for change had been defeated
with the miners, as had the power of the trade unions and the state had
been left to consolidate its free market agenda. Only through the
unified strength of the miners in complete solidarity with each other
could Thatcher have been defeated. The stress that is placed upon the
need for complete class unity when faced with long and bitter struggles
such as the days of 1984-1985, which is indeed the main lesson that
should be drawn from the strike, should never be underestimated.
WE ARE STILL PAYING THE PRICE OF THATCHERISM TODAY !
Margaret Thatcher
felt the "uneconomic" mining industry was a drain on the taxpayer and
duly privatised it, but any savings made have to be seen in the context
of the social costs to the communities affected and the resulting
benefits bill.
It is the same story in other areas hit by the loss of
heavy industry and manufacturing. So was it all worth it? Not according
to Professor Steve Fothergill, an economist at Sheffield Hallam University and one of the authors of the report.
"I would unequivocally say no because we destroyed so
much productive potential in the economy in those years and we did it in
sectors we could really do with now to improve our trading performance
in the world," he told Channel 4 News.
"Okay, we're not subsidising industry, but we're paying
to keep people on benefit instead. We need an improved trading
performance, selling more to the rest of the world, like Germany. But
our capacity to do this has been affected because so much has been
lost."
The Community Charge or Poll Tax was introduced in 1990. It was a
flat local tax on every adult and was levied instead of taxing property.A millionaire living in a mansion paid less in poll tax than a low-income family living in a small house.
Former head of the British army General Sir Michael Jackson said
that it would be impossible for the British military to confront
Argentina in case a military confrontation takes place over the
sovereignty of the Malvinas islands. “What if an Argentinean force was
able to secure the Mount Pleasant airfield? Then our ability to recover
the islands now would be just about impossible,” said Jackson in an
interview with the Sunday Telegraph.
Likewise the head of the Naval task force in the Falklands War has warned that defence cuts mean Britain can now do “precisely nothing”
to prevent Argentina retaking the islands. the Royal Navy no longer has
aircraft carriers, has lost its force of Harrier jump jets and seen its
warship fleet cut in half over the last decade. General Sir Peter
Whiteley, a former commandant general of the Royal Marines, said: ‘If
the Argentines decided to invade again we could never consider trying to
take them (the Falklands) back because of our lack of naval resources.’
And Surgeon Rear Admiral Ralph Curr, the Royal Navy’s former medical
director-general, added: ‘There’s no way we could defend the Falklands
or re-engage the Argentines if it all happened again.’ In the
Telegraph’s view, Britain can do ‘nothing’ to prevent Argentina retaking
Falkland Islands.
Margaret Thatcher’s long time good friend, serial rapist and paedophile the legendary Jimmy Savile.
Margaret Thatcher with another old friend, the torturer and mass murderer General Augusto Pinochet.
THATCHER THE SNATCHER
Thatcher the snatcher stops free milk for school children ! "A report from 'Panorama' exploring the Conservative plan to withdraw
free milk for children over seven years old and increase the price of
school dinners. Mothers and teachers voice their concerns, but Margaret
Thatcher defends her cuts and promises to plough the money that is saved
back into school buildings."
The lowcarb world has been left stunned today after the offices of The Lowcarb Diabetic received a blurred image of Carbophile aka Tubolard aka Kim Jong-un ! The image sent by satellite from Lowcarbs head of lowcarb anti intelligence, special black ops chief, Dick Duck is a major scoop for the lowcarb team. Carbophile has been on the radar of the team for over four years, and is one of the UK's most vociferous lowcarb anti’s. Operating from a safe house in Worcestershire and orchestrating other failed and brain dead failures, he has for years refused to confirm his identity. Always hiding in the shadows like a plague bearing rat, and stroking his always anonymous negative commentors, he has finally been outed.
Special Agent Dick Duck had penetrated the highly secretive North Korea, under the guise of a student along side undercover BBC reporters, and risked certain death had he been captured. Regular long time readers, may remember Dick’s roll in the termination of the Stalinist mod, known as Cugila from the largest diabetes forum in the UK. He also arranged the exit visa at the same forum, for the most effective miss-information and lowcarb anti agent code named ‘the dietition’ Dick’s last major success was the ending of the career of the gruesome special agent code name Jopar ( type two’s brought it on themselves and drain the NHS) aka the penguin.
At a special celebration drinks party at the Savoy Hotel, Lord Beantipper couldn’t contain his obvious joy “ We should have known Carbo was Kim all along, the similarities are so obvious, a hell of a lot of noise but no action, bloated and obese and as thick as a plank” Long time lowcarb diabetic blog editor Eddie Mitchell was less complimentary. “Carbo and his mistress Carbsane are a disgrace to the human race and both full of shit, those mutants should be banged up in a North Korean prison camp, with the grub situation in those hell holes, it’s the only way those fat bastards will ever lose weight” Long time lowcarb diabetic guru Rodger ‘Keto Warrior’ Jenkins stated “the lowcarb anti movement is finished, sure they make a lot of noise, but so does my arse after a Ruby Murray, but would you take dietary advice from an arsehole ?"
A kidney "grown" in the laboratory has been transplanted into animals where it started to produce urine, US scientists say.
Similar techniques to make simple body parts have already
been used in patients, but the kidney is one of the most complicated
organs made so far.
A study, in the journal Nature Medicine, showed the engineered kidneys were less effective than natural ones.
But regenerative medicine researchers said the field had huge promise.
Kidneys filter the blood to remove waste and excess water.
They are also the most in-demand organ for transplant, with long waiting
lists.
Yet the lead researcher, Dr Harald Ott, told the BBC that restoring a
small fraction of normal function could be enough: "If you're on
haemodialysis then kidney function of 10% to 15% would already make you
independent of haemodialysis. It's not that we have to go all the way."
He said the potential was huge: "If you think about the
United States alone, there's 100,000 patients currently waiting for
kidney transplants and there's only around 18,000 transplants done a
year.
"I think the potential clinical impact of a successful treatment would be enormous."
Kidney failure, brought about by poor blood glucose control, is one of the biggest hazards diabetics face, this could be the start of a life saver for many.
UA researchers have identified a clue to explain the reversible memory loss sometimes caused by the use of statins, one of the most widely prescribed medications in the world.
Some people taking statins who describe memory loss and fuzzy thoughts are told it may be due to aging or other effects. A UA research team has found that, instead, the likely problem is heightened sensitivity to the medication, which results in a decline in cognition.
Statins, the popular cholesterol-lowering class of drugs, have a number of known side effects, including the potential for muscle pain, liver damage, digestive problems and, most recently discovered, memory loss. UA researchers have made a novel observation, and the team has termed it the “beads-on-a-string” effect, which may be an indication of what is causing memory loss in patients using statins.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration and physicians continue to document that some patients experience fuzzy thinking and memory loss while taking statins, a class of global top-selling cholesterol-lowering drugs.
A University of Arizona research team has made a novel discovery in brain cells being treated with statin drugs: unusual swellings within neurons, which the team has termed the “beads-on-a-string” effect.
The team is not entirely sure why the beads form, said UA neuroscientist Linda L. Restifo, who leads the investigation. However, the team believes that further investigation of the beads will help inform why some people experience cognitive declines while taking statins.
“What we think we’ve found is a laboratory demonstration of a problem in the neuron that is a more severe version for what is happening in some peoples’ brains when they take statins,” said Restifo, a UA professor of neuroscience, neurology and cellular and molecular medicine, and principal investigator on the project.
Restifo and her team’s co-authored study and findings recently were published in Disease Models & Mechanisms, a peer-reviewed journal. Robert Kraft, a former research associate in the department of neuroscience, is lead author on the article.
Restifo and Kraft cite clinical reports noting that statin users often are told by physicians that cognitive disturbances experienced while taking statins were likely due to aging or other effects. However, the UA team’s research offers additional evidence that the cause for such declines in cognition is likely due to a negative response to statins.
The team also has found that removing statins results in a disappearance of the beads-on-a-string, and also a restoration of normal growth.
With research continuing, the UA team intends to investigate how genetics may be involved in the bead formation and, thus, could cause hypersensitivity to the drugs in people. Team members believe that genetic differences could involve neurons directly, or the statin interaction with the blood-brain barrier.
“This is a great first step on the road toward more personalized medication and therapy,” said David M. Labiner, who heads the UA department of neurology. “If we can figure out a way to identify patients who will have certain side effects, we can improve therapeutic outcomes.”
For now, the UA team has multiple external grants pending, and researchers carry the hope that future research will greatly inform the medical community and patients.
“If we are able to do genetic studies, the goal will be to come up with a predictive test so that a patient with high cholesterol could be tested first to determine whether they have a sensitivity to statins,” Restifo said.
Each week the average Briton consumes 238 teaspoonfuls of a potentially toxic
substance linked to long-term health problems – often without knowing it.
But just how hard is it to go sugar-free?
Like it or lump it, few of us get through the day without adding sugar to our
daily diet. We are a Pavlovian population made up of sugar, treacle and
toffee addicts, drawn to the taste of sweetness like bees to honey. So
ingrained is our desire that even writing about sugar now is sending my
salivary glands into overdrive as my brain reacts to the very thought of it,
whizzing neurotransmitters around to prepare my body for some serious
glucose action. Perhaps you, while reading this, are reaching – almost
unwittingly – for a chocolate Hobnob?
But that’s not a problem, is it? We could stop and eat a piece of cheese
instead – any time we wanted. Or could we?
Maybe not. It seems that our desire to load up with sugar regularly may not be
the cheeky reward-cum-energy boost we think it is. Increasingly, experts
believe we can be truly addicted to sugar. French scientists in Bordeaux
reported that in animal trials, rats chose sugar over cocaine (even when
they were addicted to cocaine), and speculated that no mammals’ sweet
receptors are naturally adapted to the high concentrations of sweet tastes
on offer in modern times. They worried, in a paper published in 2007, that
the intense stimulation of these receptors by our typical 21st-century
sugar-rich diets must generate a supra-normal reward signal in the brain,
with the potential to override self-control mechanisms and thus to lead to
addiction.
So if you feel like you are craving a chocolatey treat, that craving is more
than just a figure of speech. You may be one of the world’s most common
dependants: a sugar addict.
But take heart. Around the world, a growing body of expert opinion – the 'No
Sugar’ movement – is leading a global fightback and warning that our sweet
habit is completely out of control, leaving a nasty taste in the mouth of
the body public. Sugar, whether added to food by you or the manufacturer, is
the greatest threat to human health, bar none, they say. And unless we wise
up and quit en masse, we don’t just risk personal obesity and disease, but
national bankruptcy and collapse as the toll our ill health takes on
our countries’ economies threatens to destabilise the modern world.
On a drizzly Saturday afternoon before setting out shopping I did my usual flip around some of the blogs which are on the side bar. Looking at the sunny pictures on The Diabetic Mediterranean Blog my eye was taken by this great story, and a couple of paragraphs are shown below. Please click on the link below and share another inspirational story.
"I am a 74 year old diabetic (T2) and have been following Bernstein’s
plan for 26 months. I have lost 51 lbs, lowered my intake of insulin and
have had reversal of several diabetic complications. My blood chemistry
is much better than before and my A1c has gone from 9.1 to 5.0. My
blood pressure is lower and I am healthier in virtually every measured
way.
I cannot bring myself to abandon all fruits but I found I can satisfy
myself with a quarter of an apple, a half of an orange, a quarter of a
grapefruit, etc. I eat them much more slowly and with concentrated
mental feelings of enjoyment. I currently limit myself to 40 grams of
carbs per day and I continue to lose weight at the rate of a pound and a
quarter a month. There was a long plateau period of no weight loss in
the middle of the two years (13 months) but I kept at it. It has paid
off."
The more you look into lowcarbing for the control of diabetes, and understand fully how it works, the more you come to realise there is no other way. What are the alternatives ? Chasing highly elevated blood glucose numbers, with ever increasing medication. Many of the type two drugs are close to useless for lowering BG, and many have been banned or come with horrendous side effects for many.
For five years I have been asking healthcare professionals, dietitions and lowcarb antis, how do I hold non diabetic HbA1c, stable weight, good lipids etc etc on two metformin pills a day, other than lowcarb. I have yet to receive an answer.
There is no other way, the ACCORD trial was ended early because using multi-drug regimes the participants were dropping like flies. OK the ACCORD study had many faults. A bright chimp could see where that masterpiece of how to kill people and waste a lot of money was going. But it proved one thing for sure. Ramming down highly elevated BG numbers with drugs is doomed to failure.
Someone suggested to me yesterday, this blog was launching Ad hominem attacks on certain people. One definition of Ad hominem attacks “Ad hominem is an attack on the person, not the person's arguments” When I had stopped laughing, I explained to the person. 1. Evelyn Kocur and her crew spend most of their time launching Ad hominem attacks on people and 2. How do you take on an argument, when the likes of Kocur and other lowcarb antis, have no argument. These people know everything there is to know about what does not work (they think they do) but know zilch about what does work. Nothing has worked for Evelyn ! With all her bounce, all the verbal, all the science, she can’t get anywhere near a safe weight, nor can many of her followers, I suspect.
The way I see it, when people attack me, or what I hold to be true, through years of personal experience, the same applies to countless diabetics I know or know of. When bitter and jealous dullards take on people who have become friends such as Jimmy Moore, who has helped me and countless others, I am going on the attack, big time. For me this is total war, no Queensbury rules, no prisoners, no mercy shown or expected. Ludicrous dietary information killed off members of my family. They would expect nothing less from me. The fight goes on !
Please pick up your hymn books my fellow lowcarb evangelists and sing with me Hymn 552- Fight the Good Fight.
Regards Eddie
Fight the good fight with all thy might; Lowcarb is thy Strength, and health thy Right; Lay hold on life, and it shall be Thy joy and health eternally.
Run the straight race through lowcarbs good grace, Lift up thine eyes, and seek it’s face; Life with its way before us junk food lies, Lowcarb is the Path, and health the Prize.
Cast care aside, upon thy Guide, Lean, and it’s mercy will provide; Lean, and the trusting soul shall prove Lowcarb is Life, and you it Loves.
Faint not nor fear, our arms are near, We changeth not, and thou art dear. Only believe, and thou shalt see That lowcarb is all in all to thee.
April 11, 2013 -- A new oral diabetes drug is expected to arrive on pharmacy shelves in the U.S. this week.
Many people predict that Invokana (canagliflozin), approved by the FDA in March, will be a brisk seller. That's partly because it treatstype 2 diabetes in a new way.
It’s also because Invokana not only helped patients improve blood sugar control, but also lose weight and control their high blood pressure, according to maker Janssen Pharmaceutical Companies.
Losing weight can help people control their diabetes.
In one 26-week study, those on Invokana lost about 6 to 8 pounds, while those in the placebo group lost only about a pound.
But the drug has side effects, including infections of the urinary tract, penis, and vagina. This leads some experts to have less enthusiasm for the new medicine.
It will also cost a lot more than other diabetes drugs. The wholesale cost for Invokana is $8.77 a pill, according to Katie Mahony, a spokeswoman for Janssen. Retail cost for the 100-milligram starting dose, without co-pays or coverage, is about $10 a pill, or $300 a month.
The popular diabetes drug metformin can cost as little as 25 cents a pill.
"It's another way to control diabetes without injections," says Anthony McCall, MD. He is the James M. Moss Professor of Medicine at the University of Virginia School of Medicine in Charlottesville. He was not involved in the development of the new drug.
A new pill is welcome, McCall says, for some of the estimated 24 million Americans with type 2 diabetes, especially as an alternative to injecting insulin.
"People do have strong feelings about injectable medications," he says. However, he and other experts say they don't expect Invokana to replace other drugs, but rather to offer another option.
How Invokana Works
In type 2 diabetes, the body doesn’t make enough insulin or doesn't use it properly. As a result, blood sugar (glucose) levels rise, leading to complications such asheart disease, kidney damage, and nerve problems.
Invokana works by blocking glucose from being reabsorbed by the kidneys. That raises the amount of glucose urinated, and lowers the amount of glucose in your blood.
The new drug is known as a selective sodium glucose co-transporter inhibitor, or SGLT2. Other drug companies are also working on this type of drug.
Other diabetes drugs work in differently. Some lower the amount of glucose made by the liver, while others stimulate the pancreas to release more insulin. And still many others work in different ways.
While Invokana isn't expected to replace other diabetes drugs, ''it's certainly promising," says Aaron Cypess, MD, PhD, of the Joslin Diabetes Center and an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. "It's a mechanism we understand and that makes sense."
But, he says, he does not predict it will be the first drug doctors turn to when medication is needed to treat type 2 diabetes.
If lifestyle changes like diet, exercise, and weight loss don't control blood sugar enough, metformin is recommended first, says Richard Siegel, MD. That was spelled out in the 2012 American College of Physician treatment guidelines. Siegel is co-director of the Outpatient Diabetes Center at Tufts Medical Center and is an associate professor of medicine at the university's school of medicine in Boston.
Controlling blood sugar can lower the risk of complications such as heart disease, eye disease, and kidney and nerve problems.
What Studies Found: Invokana
In one of the Invokana studies, patients took the drug by itself. Other studies looked at results of the drug when used with other drugs, such as metformin.
A similar number of patients got their levels of A1c -- a test that measures blood sugar control -- down to the target of less than 7% whether they used Invokana alone or with metformin (45% and 46%, respectively, over a 26-week period). The same was true for how much weight they lost. People taking Invokana alone lost 8.5 pounds over 26 weeks, while those taking both drugs lost a little more than 9 pounds in the same time period.
Invokana worked better, the company says, in lowering weight and levels of A1c than the drugs sitagliptin (Januvia) or glimepiride (Amaryl).
Other side effects of Invokana include kidney problems, too much potassium in the blood, low blood sugar, and fainting.
Having more sugar in urine can be a problem, says Cypess, sometimes leading to urinary tract infections and yeast infections.
"It will make people go to the bathroom more often," McCall says. That could be a problem, he says, for men with an enlarged prostate (who already need to urinate frequently) or women with incontinence.
When the FDA approved Invokana, it asked Janssen to conduct post-marketing research on several areas, including any effects on the heart, pancreas, liver, and bones.
Last year, a similar drug, Forxiga (dapagliflozin), was turned down by the FDA. The agency cited concerns about breast and bladder cancer risk, among others. The drug was approved in Europe.
However, another benefit, possible weight loss, would be welcomed by many patients, McCall says. "You mention weight loss as a side effect of diabetes drugs and people perk up."
Check out our about me (which means us, we work as a team) and it says.
“We are a small band of diabetics all low carbers. Posting links to diabetes related articles and low carb food advice. In our spare time we like to lampoon the spreaders of fear and misinformation. Welcome to the crazy world of diabetes.”
That’s what we do. We try to put up current and useful health and diabetes related items. Our recipe blog is very basic, but will get a new recruit, to the lowcarb lifestyle, a good start on their way to a healthier way of eating, and should reduce medication for many diabetics. Hopefully it will help people to not become a type two diabetic. Our website again is very basic and simple. It is aimed at the newly diagnosed, or long term out of control diabetic. Page after page of cut and paste high tech science is the last thing they need. Simple works and keeps on working. So far, so good.
People sometimes say to us, we like your blog and website, but why all the aggro, why waste your time with negative and bitter people, people who have failed and have nothing positive to offer. That’s a simple question and the answer is. We have noticed over the years on forums and blogs, when heated argument or a bun fight is in progress, the members logged on or page views go up. If you are on a mission and have a passionate cause you believe in that’s great. But if people aren’t reading your blog, you're talking to yourself.
A great example from last night. The Free The Animal blog, run by a man called Richard Nikoley in the US, posted an article on his blog yesterday. In this item he linked to our blog and a wind up cartoon. Our page views went up by over 300 more than normal during the night. Richard’s blog has a huge readership, and is one of the number one blogs in the paleo and lowcarb world. So, many come over and have a laugh, some may think our blog is rubbish, some may think we are a bunch of misfits, who knows. But here’s the rub, someone may have visited our blog and stayed awhile, some may have read through our what we call (Capt. Sensible posts) if one person learned something to their advantage, and went away with information, that will assist them in greater control of their diabetes or weight, then for us that is a great result.
So, that’s one reason for the grief, there are many more, but that will do for today.
Have a great weekend and thank you to all who support us.
Having a trawl around some diabetes forums I came across this story. A very well controlled diabetic (surprise, surprise a lowcarber) sent a letter to Diabetes UK, not be confused with the website and forum diabetes.co.uk. The person had sent a letter to DUK part of below.
“As the leading representatives of diabetics in the UK, DUK is very influential and yet on the web site and magazine, there seems to be very little encouragement of diabetics to eat a lower carb diet. The UK's record for attaining safe blood glucose levels among Type 1s is shockingly poor and among Type 2s it is not much better. As an influential lobbying organisation, I believe it is important that DUK puts the lower carb message to the forefront of its literature and helps improve the figures for those attaining safe HbA1cs.”
And this was the response from DUK.:
“I can appreciate your comments on low-carb diets and how in your case it was important for you to change your diet to obtain control over your diabetes.
With regards to whether people should eat low carbohydrate diets and diet information in general, Diabetes UK believes that for most people it is sensible to eat a balanced healthy diet which is low in fat (especially saturated fats), low in sugar and highly refined carbohydrates, and low in salt.
What we want is to help people to find a way of eating healthily that they can stick to and enjoy - and for most people with diabetes (and for most people without diabetes as well) that means that people are better served by a diet that incorporates a reasonable portion of starchy carbohydrate at each meal. If you are overweight, it is important to lose weight by watching the amount you eat as well as the kind of foods you eat
The actual amount of carbohydrate that the body needs varies depending on your age, weight and activity levels, but it should make up about half of what you eat and drink. For good health most of this should be from starchy carbohydrate, fruits and some dairy foods, with no more than one fifth of your total carbohydrate to come from added sugar or table sugar.
I will pass your email onto our relevant team for their views and I thank you for bringing this issue to our attention.
We do hope this has been helpful but please do get in touch with us again if you need to. You can also call the Careline on the number below if you would like to talk things through.”
The gruesome NHS audit figures for HbA1c for England. HbA1c is arguably the most important factor to avoid diabetic complications. Most of the numbers in this audit are way above the level serious organ damage occurs.
Results for England. The National Diabetes Audit 2010-2011 Percentage of registered Type 1patients in England HbA1c >= 6.5% (48 mmol/mol) = 92.6% HbA1c > 7.5% (58 mmol/mol) = 71.3% HbA1c > 10.0% (86 mmol/mol) = 18.1%
Percentage of registered Type 2 patients in England HbA1c >= 6.5% (48 mmol/mol = 72.5% HbA1c > 7.5% (58 mmol/mol) = 32.6% HbA1c >10.0% (86 mmol/mol) = 6.8%
People with diabetes are
being urged to check their blood glucose meters after a potentially
dangerous fault was identified in two models.
The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency
(MHRA) said around 22,000 people use the One Touch Verio Pro and One
Touch Verio IQ meters.
Both models, used across the UK, are manufactured by LifeScan. The MHRA said the Pro gives falsely low readings and the IQ turns off if a person has an extremely high reading, The problem also affects meters used by health professionals
in hospitals and other settings. An alert has been sent out to them as
well.The MHRA warned the software fault could mean diagnosis and treatment are delayed.
Medical devices director John Wilkinson said: "Extremely high
blood glucose levels in people are rare, but if they do occur the
person will require immediate medical attention."
The faulty Pro model has serial numbers that start with RA, RB, RC, RD and RE, while the IQ numbers start with TA or TB.People who have the meters are being asked to contact LifeScan on 0800 279 9118 and it will be replaced free of charge.
After diabetes diagnosis, and when a diabetic follows his healthcare professionals advice, he finds it almost beyond belief when he/she learns the truth. Having been told to base meals on starchy carbohydrates and realising the advice is at best ridiculous, and at worst criminal, it seems a surreal scenario. It’s ludicrous in the extreme, and beggars belief, so poor is the standard dietary information given to diabetics. The NHS and outfits like DUK and the ADA lumber on, destroying ever more lives year in and year out, that’s the way it is. Unless you are a well informed diabetic, the minority, of a minority, of the total population, it goes pretty much unnoticed. Now, this travesty over common sense and logic, large as it is, pales into insignificance when you stand back and look at the big picture.
So, let’s forget diabetes, we like to discuss a wide range of topics here, and start some dialogue regarding why I believe the US, the UK and most of the world, is heading for total economic collapse and social Armageddon. Some readers may be well ahead of the game than me, others I believe will find some of the posts and information in coming days, so incredulous it makes the crazy word of diabetes look sane. Check out the first short video, it will help make a complex concept easy to understand, as I take you on a journey into the world of Fractional Reserve Banking, and the monumental Ponzi scheme, close to collapse.
Size really does matter, according to a study which found that a man's
attractiveness is at least in part determined by what he carries in his
trousers.
Women who were shown various computer-generated images of naked men
consistently rated those with larger members as being most attractive.
While various studies have shown that taller men are generally considered more
attractive, researchers found that penis length was as important as height
in determining a man's sex appeal.
Perhaps worryingly for some men, there was no point at which increasing length
and width started to lose their appeal, with results suggesting the "ideal
size" – if it exists – must be larger than any of the 343 figures used
in the study.
Penis length had a particularly strong bearing on the attractiveness of taller
men, possibly because their height might produce an unfavourable "size
contrast effect", and appeared to be especially important to larger
women, researchers said.
A reader made a comment in the forum below the article and he clearly knows what he is talking about.
"A study conducted by UCLA's Department of Psychiatry has revealed that
the kind of face a woman finds attractive on a man can differ depending
on where she is in her menstrual cycle. For example: if she is
ovulating, she is attracted to men with rugged and masculine features.
However, if she is menstruating or menopausal, she tends to be more
attracted to a man with duct tape over his mouth and a spear lodged in
his chest with a baseball bat up his arse while he is on fire. No
further studies are expected on this subject."
OBJECTIVE Hypoglycemia is associated with serious health outcomes for patients treated for diabetes. However, the outcome of outpatients with type 2 diabetes who have experienced hypoglycemia episodes is largely unknown.
RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS The study population, derived from the National Health Insurance Research Database released by the Taiwan National Health Research Institutes during 1998–2009, comprised 77,611 patients with newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes. We designed a prospective study consisting of randomly selected hypoglycemic type 2 diabetic patients and matched type 2 diabetic patients without hypoglycemia. We investigated the relationships of hypoglycemia with total mortality and cardiovascular events, including stroke, coronary heart disease, cardiovascular diseases, and all-cause hospitalization.
RESULTS There were 1,844 hypoglycemic events (500 inpatients and 1,344 outpatients) among the 77,611 patients. Both mild (outpatient) and severe (inpatient) hypoglycemia cases had a higher percentage of comorbidities, including hypertension, renal diseases, cancer, stroke, and heart disease. In multivariate Cox regression models, including diabetes treatment adjustment, diabetic patients with hypoglycemia had a significantly higher risk of cardiovascular events during clinical treatment periods. After constructing a model adjusted with propensity scores, mild and severe hypoglycemia still demonstrated higher hazard ratios (HRs) for cardiovascular diseases (HR 2.09 [95% CI 1.63–2.67]), all-cause hospitalization (2.51 [2.00–3.16]), and total mortality (2.48 [1.41–4.38]).
CONCLUSIONS Symptomatic hypoglycemia, whether clinically mild or severe, is associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular events, all-cause hospitalization, and all-cause mortality. More attention may be needed for diabetic patients with hypoglycemic episodes.
After five years of lowcarbing I have not experienced a single hypoglycemic event, the simple reason being I don't need hypoglycemic medications to keep my blood glucose at safe levels.
Patients who discontinue treatment with a statin because of mild side effects should be encouraged to try again, as most will find they can take one of the drugs in the longer term, suggest researchers.
US researchers found most patients who stopped treatment because of a presumed statin-related event were then prescribed the same or a different statin – and nine out ten of these were still taking it a year later.
Few patients experienced another statin-related event and rhabdomyolysis was rare, while patients who had creatine kinase (CK) elevations were also able to continue statin therapy long term.
The authors said their findings suggested many statin-related events are either caused by something else, are in fact tolerable, or are related to a specific statin rather than the class of drugs as a whole.
In the study, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, the researchers used specially designed software to analyse the text clinicians had entered in electronic medical records for 107,835 adults who received a statin prescription between January 2000 and the end of December 2008.
They found 18,778 (17%) of the patients had a statin-related event documented, of which less than a third were clearly categorised as such. Most of these were myalgia or myopathy.
Of all the patients with a statin-related event recorded, 11,124 (59%) discontinued the drug at least temporarily. Over half – 6,579 – of these patients then tried taking a statin again and 6,064 (90%) were still taking it 12 months after the original statin-related event.
This included nearly half of the 2,721 patients who were given the same statin they were taking to begin with, of whom over one third were taking it at the same or a higher dose.
In addition, of 122 patients who had a CK level three times or more greater than the ULN but were rechallenged with a statin, less than 10% discontinued statin treatment long term.
The authors concluded: ‘Our findings indicate that patients who had statin-related clinical events may frequently be able to tolerate statins in the long term. Permanent cessation of statin therapy under these circumstances could lead to many preventable cardiovascular events and deaths.
‘Providers should consider rechallenging patients who report statin-related events to identify those who can continue taking them.’
My diabetes was diagnosed by chance in 2009, when my GP asked me to have a fasting blood test due to raised BP. This came back at 7.1, I was asked to have another one which came back at 9. I have since found out that another blood test in 2006 showed a fasting level of 6.6, but for some reason I was never informed I was pre-diabetic. Knowing what I know now my sugars would have been running wild during that time. I had been overweight for many years but always active, people often said I should have been skinny as I was always busy, but at the time of diagnosis I weighed more than 16 stone and whatever I did, it didn’t seem to shift. I also ate lots of fruit; sometimes seven pieces a day, granary bread, pasta and rice, plus fruit juice. I was literally welcoming diabetes but didn’t know it at the time, had I known I was pre-diabetic I might have done some research and avoided becoming a fully paid up member of the club no one wants to join. Just before diagnosis I remember having a really ‘carby’ day when I felt so sleepy and my feet were burning, as if on fire, couldn’t get rid of it for over a day, I am sure these were the effects of very high sugars. Looking back I often felt sleepy after lots of carbs, but put it down to a demanding job and life.
I had no real advice on diagnosis, just told to ‘eat a healthy diet’. I have a friend who has been type 2 for a long time and I knew you were supposed to check your blood sugar. I asked for a meter and was told I would be given one by the diabetic nurse when I saw her eventually. Meanwhile I did some reading online, was devastated to find out the implications of uncontrolled diabetes and felt my life was over. However I was lucky that within less than a week I had found this site and also Fergus who I emailed about his lowcarb bread. That was the beginning of hope for a healthier future for me. I cut out carbs drastically, when I got my meter I found that just one piece of Burgen bread sent my blood sugar to double figures, as did one weetabix and a drizzle of milk. That was it; I knew that there had to be something odd about the standard dietary advice if I wanted to get good bs control. At my first hba1c, after 2 months of strict lowcarbing, it was at 7.2, I know it would have been much higher if it had been taken at diagnosis. My hba1c has since dropped gradually, my latest being 5.4. My bloods are good, kidneys perfect, my hdl cholesterol is 48% and triglycerides are 0.5. I eat cream, butter and cheese etc. I have also lost more than 4 stones in weight. I feel much better and look it too. People always ask how I did it and can’t believe it sadly when I say I don’t eat many carbs but I do eat fat. I was always a keen cook and after initial despair at what was I going to eat, I now relish the challenge of adapting recipes and inventing new dishes which fit into my new lifestyle.
My GP says that he can’t remember a diabetic in the practice with such a low hba1c for a long time, but is very evasive when I ask about the madness of the standard dietary advice, and I am just told the famous mantra....’If it works for you...’ If it works for me why not for others? I know that ‘we are all different’ but the present dietary advice to eat lots of carbs, particularly when many are also told not to test is madness, testing is essential for everyone, only then do you find out what you can or can’t eat.
My family has a history of glaucoma and I have an annual eye check to ensure my eye pressure hasn’t increased. My job involves working with children with a visual impairment and I am well aware of how precious sight is. Interestingly my eye pressure had risen the year before diagnosis, but after 3 months low carbing it had dropped and earlier this month when I saw my optician he couldn’t believe how much further it had gone down. I told him that I was convinced that it had gone up due to high blood sugars and that it was now much improved due to good bs control, which he thoroughly agreed with, another bonus.
Who knows what is around the corner, but all I can say is that at the moment life is good, I am healthier than I have been in years and have made some wonderful friends who I am convinced have helped to save my life.
We all carry our mobile phones with names & numbers stored in its memory. If we were to be involved in an accident or were taken ill, the people attending us would have our mobile phone but wouldn't know who to call. Yes, there are hundreds of numbers stored but which one is the contact person in case of an emergency? Hence this 'ICE' (In Case of Emergency) Campaign. The concept of 'ICE' is catching on quickly. It is a method of contact during emergency situations. As mobile phones are carried by the majority of the population, all you need to do is store the number of a contact person or persons who should be contacted during emergency under the name 'ICE' ( In Case Of Emergency). The idea was thought up by a paramedic who found that when he went to the scenes of accidents there were always mobile phones with patients but they didn't know which number to call. He therefore thought that it would be a good idea if there was a nationally recognized name for this purpose.In an emergency situation, Emergency Service personnel and hospital staff would be able to quickly contact the right person by simply dialing the number you have stored as 'ICE'. Please forward this. It won't take too many 'forwards' before everybody will know about this. It really could save your life, or put a loved one's mind at rest. For more than one contact name simply enter ICE1, ICE2 and ICE3 etcPASS THIS AROUND AS MANY PEOPLE AS POSSIBLE AS THIS CAN HELP IN AN EMERGENCY
