Study: Exercise Helps Patients With Diabetes Cut Waist Size

A new study finds that exercise can aid patients with diabetes in reducing their waist circumference and body fat, as well as improving HbA_1c levels.

A team including researchers from the University of Texas Southwestern and Louisiana State University studied 202 sedentary type 2 diabetes patients with a mean age of 57.1 years, each of whom had participated in the Health Benefits of Aerobic and Resistance Training in Individuals With Type 2 Diabetes (HART-D) trial. The patients—63% of whom were women—were randomized for 9 months to 1 of 4 groups: an aerobic-exercise group, a resistance-training group, a combined aerobic exercise- and resistance-training group, and a control group that did not exercise.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

RELATED CONTENT
Exercise for Patients With Diabetic Peripheral Neuropathy
Exercise Can Improve Glycemic Control: How to Get Patients Started
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The authors note that participants in all the exercise groups improved waist circumference, body fat percentage, and HbA_1c levels in comparison to the control group. These improvements were seen in the patients from the exercise groups, regardless of whether they showed progress in terms of cardiorespiratory fitness.

As such, the investigators suggest that exercise-training programs should focus on metabolic parameters in individuals with type 2 diabetes, and assess these parameters for improvement.

“Really, [these results are] 1 more example of how exercise provides substantial benefits, even without large reductions in weight or improvement in fitness levels,” says Timothy Church, MD, MPH, PhD, a professor of preventative medicine at Louisiana State University’s Biomedical Research Center, and a co-author of the study.

“In this instance,” says Church, “the focus was waist circumference, which of course is a very important cardio-metabolic risk factor.”

—Mark McGraw

Reference

Pandey A, Swift D, et al. Metabolic Effects of Exercise Training Among Fitness Nonresponsive Patients With Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus: The HART-D Study. Diabetes Care. 2015.