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Numerous studies supply diet and lifestyle changes to prevent diabetes. Now a new study says following the Mediterranean diet could be the trick.
The diet, noted for its rich foods and low saturated fats, adds nuts, fish, whole grain products, olive oil and vegetables to your daily nutrition. Experts believe these kinds of food sources with added emphasis on increasing olive oil intake may help those people who are at high-risk for heart disease by preventing diabetes.
Researchers from Rovira i Virgili University in Spain reviewed information from a lot more than 3,500 people ages 55 to 80 at high-risk for heart disease over a six-year time period. All participants had a minimum of three or more heart disease risk factors, but none of them have been diagnosed with diabetes.
They discovered that the folks put on a Mediterranean diet were 30 percent not as likely to build up diabetes within the next four years. This is in comparison to those found on a normal low-fat diet. Participants weren’t asked to change their calorie counts or add in any exercise programs.
“Randomized trials have shown that lifestyle interventions promoting weight loss can reduce the incidence of Type 2 diabetes, however, whether dietary changes without calorie restriction or increased exercise also protect from diabetes development is not evaluated previously,” said the study’s lead author Dr. Jordi Salas-Salvado in a statement to Reuters Health.
Researchers found that after four years, 273 from the participants developed diabetes, with 8.8 percent of these being in the low-fat diet group, 6.9 % for all those in the Mediterranean diet group getting their unsaturated fat from essential olive oil and 7.4 percent for those around the Mediterranean diet with focus on mixed nuts.
The conclusions of the study may be a coincidence, researchers add, and are unable to explain why the mixed nuts diet didn’t have exactly the same benefit because the olive oil diet.
Salas-Salvado believes that combining a Mediterranean diet and lowering daily calorie intake might help minimize risks much more.
“These benefits happen to be noticed in participants between 55 to 80 years old at high cardiovascular risk,” Salas-Salvado said. “Therefore, the message is it isn’t too late to switch to some healthy diet such as the Mediterranean.”
