High Intensity Exercise Prevents Diabetes Better Than Low Intensity

From Fitness & Health with Dr. Gabe Mirkin:

How does exercise prevent diabetes?

An exciting study from Yale shows that intense exercise is far more effective in preventing and controlling diabetes than exercising at a leisurely pace (Journal of Applied Physiology, January 2006). Inactive, healthy, non-obese women over 72 years of age were started in training programs of hard (80 percent of aerobic capacity), moderate (65 percent) and easy (50 percent). All three groups did the same amount of work, burning 300 calories per session. The intense group had a great improvement in their ability to use sugar and suppress fat formation, while the low intensity group had little benefit.

This means that intense exercise can help both to prevent and to treat diabetes. The most tissue damage occurs immediately after eating, when blood sugar levels rise the highest. After you eat, sugar goes from the intestines into the bloodstream. The only places that sugar can be stored are in your muscles and liver. When your muscles are not exercised, they are full of sugar and sugar has no place to go after it enters your bloodstream. On the other hand, when your muscles are exercised, they empty their stored sugar. Then when you eat, sugar can go from the intestines into the bloodstream and then immediately into the muscles, preventing a high rise in blood sugar.

The exciting news from this study is that the more intensely you exercise, the greater the protection from developing diabetes and the better the control of your diabetes if you already have it. A word of caution: 75 percent of diabetics die from heart disease and some people can suffer heart attacks during intense exercise, so check with your doctor first.

This is good information to use on my clients who think that walking the dog around the block is cardio. At least I know that two or three times a week they get their muscles emptied of glucose when they train with me. That has to help a little bit.

Technorati Tags: Diabetes, Weight training, Glucose, Blood sugar, Exercise, Intensity