Scientists from Food and Nutritional Sciences found that a high-protein diet with resistance exercise helps with weight loss in type 2 diabetes.
The study aimed to see how two low-fat, hypocaloric diets affected weight loss, body fat, and heart disease risk in overweight or obese people with type 2 diabetes.
The diets had different ratios of carbohydrates to protein, and some people also did supervised resistance exercise training for 16 weeks.
83 men and women with type 2 diabetes participated in the study. They were split into four groups:
a standard carbohydrate diet (CON), a high protein diet (HP), a standard carbohydrate diet with resistance exercise training (CON+RT), or a high protein diet with resistance exercise training (HP+RT).
The team found that the group following the high protein diet with resistance exercise training experienced the greatest reductions in body weight, fat mass, and waist circumference.
They lost an average of 13.8 kg of body weight, 11.1 kg of fat mass, and 13.7 cm of waist circumference, which was significantly more than the other three groups.
The team found all participants experienced improvements in glycemic control and cardiovascular disease risk markers, including reductions in blood pressure, glucose, insulin, A1C, triglycerides, total cholesterol, and LDL cholesterol, with no differences between the groups.
The findings suggest that combining an energy-restricted high-protein diet with resistance exercise training can lead to greater weight loss and more favorable changes in body composition in overweight or obese patients with type 2 diabetes.
However, the study had limitations, including a small sample size and a relatively short duration.
Further research is needed to confirm these findings and determine the long-term effects of this approach on health outcomes in this population.
The research was published in Diabetes Care and was conducted by Thomas P Wycherley et al.
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