How to prevent pre-diabetes
Pre diabetes and family history
Knowledge is power when it comes fighting and defeating pre-diabetes. Specifically, having some insights into your family’s background as far as who had high blood sugar and what might have caused it . . . . is adding another a weapon to your arsenal.
Having a family history of this disease has been shown to directly impact on succeeding generations. We know that type 1 or juvenile diabetes is genetically linked to our ancestors. In a similar fashion, type 2 or adult onset diabetes, also can be linked to previous generations, albeit through different causes.
According to the American Diabetes Association Care Journal there is a significant association between family history and the prevalence of diabetes in the U.S. population. It is the estimated that the prevalence of familial risk of diabetes in the U.S. population is about 1 of every 3 adults has a moderate to high risk and about 1 of every 13 adults has a high risk of developing type 2 diabetes.
This fact is important because it gives healthcare providers another piece if information to pass on to their patients about how to prevent pre-diabetes. We can now add familial history to the list of previously known indications for pre-diabetes. By now you should be well familiar with other risk factors of this disease —such as being overweight or obese, the need to urinate more frequently or feeling of numbness in the extremities.
An example of this might be of family that lived in a certain area and only ate foods that was conducive to blood sugars being higher than normal or maybe their activity was inconsistent . . . causing them to be over-weight or obese. The children would copy the eating habits of their parents as the norm.
I have cousins, related to me through an uncle, whose mother was diabetic. Both her grandparents developed type 2 diabetes and lived well into their nineties, which can be attributed to the healthy diet they ate and the hard work they did all their lives. After immigrating to the US, several of these cousins have developed diabetes and need to take daily medications to live a normal live. If they had been cognizant of the fact that a history of familial diabetes would put them at a higher risk they would have been more vigilant of its symptoms and acted on them.
Generations of family have lived on poor quality foods because they couldn’t do better or had no access to better quality food products and simply ate what was available . This is evident among certain ethnic groups who consume a common diet or people eating overly processed and unnaturally sweetened food products.
Having this familial link does not imply that succeeding generations will develop the disease but that they are at a higher risk than those not having this connection.
If you knew that grandma and or grandpa had high blood sugar and were overweight and had developed diabetes with complications, then you would be forewarned. Having this insight should equip you with necessary information to be able to avoid the same fate by making a few simple adjustments in your lifestyle.
Get to know your family history. If you have or suspect that you may have a family member who had or have diabetes and you are displaying any related symptoms, then you should consult with your doctor. Full blown diabetes is no joke but you can avoid it if you know the facts and take action.
Exercise is one of the best way to defeat pre diabetes. How much exercise did you do last week? Even if you don’t have this disease you should get in at least 150 minutes each week. Start slowly and you will improve over time.
Visit How to Prevent Pre-diabetes for targeted exercises that will help to prevent pre diabetes.