How to prevent diabetes?
When we hear about diabetes we mostly think of type 2 diabetes. So nowadays when someone says diabetes it is by default type 2 diabetes mellitus. Nowadays it has become very common ailment and literally every family has someone suffering from type 2 diabetes.
Once you get diabetic it brings a lot of restrictions and morbidities which may affect the way you live. It affects your physical capacity to work and also affects you mentally. Additionally it affects multiple organs of your body.
In the long run diabetes can damage your kidneys, heart, limbs and you may get many more complications like retinal diseases and blindness and stroke.
So once you are sick with disease you need to bear treatment cost for that and also you need to bear treatment cost of its complications.
So, rather than suffering an ailment and its complications it is always better not to get that ailment itself. Here we will discuss some tips about ‘how to prevent diabetes?’
As you may be knowing type 2 diabetes is a multifactorial disease that is caused by many factors. First we will list the factors that can make you diabetic then we will discuss their prevention.
Table of Contents
Factors that can cause diabetes type 2
- Obesity
- Sedentary lifestyle
- Inadequate sleep
- Stress
- Hypertension
- Smoking
- Drinking alcohol
- Eating refined sugars and carbs
- No exercise and physical activities
Above list gives the most common factors pushing someone to get diabetes type 2. In the process of type 2 diabetes your body reduces production of insulin or cannot use it efficiently in both the cases your blood sugar rises abnormally high posing you its consequences.
Obesity
Are you overweight or obese? Those who are overweight or obese are more likely to get diabetes and they are affected multiple ways. Obesity is defined by BMI which is body mass index.
Those with BMI more than 27 are considered as obese and bmi is calculated as
BMI = (weight in kgsquare of Height in meters)
Sedentary lifestyle
Sedentary lifestyle is the main cause of lifestyle diseases. Since the time vehicles were invented and we have all the machines from grinding food to washing clothes we have become more and more sedentary.
With a sedentary lifestyle we have got more chances of getting type 2 diabetes.
Inadequate sleep
This is the factor which leads to obesity and stress. The reasons for inadequate sleep can be many like using screens at night or using drugs like tobacco and alcohol, excess use of tea and coffee.
Inadequate sleep can make you susceptible to hypertension and diabetes.
Stress
Stress can be of any type stress of work and you are not able to sleep or get time for physical exercise for this reason, may cause obesity and poses you to increased risk of diabetes and hypertension too.
Hypertension
Hypertension and obesity, diabetes are all lifestyle diseases so many underlying factors causing them are common. You do have increased risk of diabetes type 2 if you have hypertension.
Drinking alcohol
Drinking alcohol in excess makes you more prone for obesity and hypertension. It increases the risk of diabetes type 2. Alcohol should be consumed in moderation or should be avoided.
Smoking
Smoking may be passive or active and may pose you to increased risk of diabetes and hypertension. If you have smoking habits and you have diabetes it increases the chance of getting diabetes related complications like stroke and blindness by manyfold.
Refined sugars
Do you eat readymade food regularly? In recent years food is increasingly prepared by industry. Food produced by industry contains an excess amount of refined sugars and refined carbohydrates. They are responsible for excess weight gain and poses you to increased risk of getting type 2 diabetes.
No exercise and physical activities
Excess workload and not time for physical exercise makes you increasingly susceptible to getting diabetes type 2.
These are some common factors which make you suffer from lifestyle diseases like diabetes and hypertension and obesity.
Now we will discuss what steps you should take to prevent diabetes type 2. We will list those factors first then we will explain them in detail.
Steps to prevent diabetes
- Start right from childhood
- Follow it like a routine
- Daily adequate sleep
- Daily adequate exercise
- Healthy food
- Daily physical activities
- Stop smoking
- Avoid alcohol
- Get regular check ups
Start right from childhood
We get most of our good habits from childhood. Nowadays it should be a focus for everyone to concentrate on their children. Teach them how important is daily exercise and healthy food.
Restrict your children from using screens for more than 1 hour a day. Your children should not spend more than one hour a day in front of TV or video games or mobiles.
Encourage them to play outdoor games daily.
Follow it like a routine
Like you work, eat and sleep daily you should exercise daily and consider it as important activity as eating and sleeping.
Many of us decide to follow a healthy lifestyle but they cannot sustain those for long. You should be motivated to help yourself to prevent diabetes. The strongest motivation comes from inside rather than from someone else.
Above two are the strategies to initiate and sustain a good healthy and disease free lifestyle now in detail we will see what are those healthy habits and what we can do to follow them.
Daily adequate sleep
Do you take sleep adequately? Here we state adequately because sleep requirements can be different for everyone.
For someone 6 hour are adequate and for someone even 10 hours a day is inadequate. The crux of the story is if you wake up fresh and you do not have feelings of fatigue or anxiety while you work then you have good sleep even if it is less in number of hours.
Daily adequate exercise
Daily adequate exercise is very important for you to prevent diabetes. Like healthy food and healthy sleeping habits it is very important that you exercise daily.
Following are some steps in details about exercise:
- Make it a routine. Like you eat food daily, make this activity a daily routine. According to your comfort you should decide your time to exercise. Generally doing exercise in the morning is a good habit but if not possible do it when you get time.
- Make it essential. Make it a routine and daily needed essential activity. You will not follow a daily routine unless you make it an essential daily activity. You may join a group of people who exercise daily to stay motivated or maybe you can do it alone as you like.
- Try to do it outdoors. Daily exercise especially in the morning and outdoors help to maintain your sleep wake cycle and also helps to keep you healthy and away from diabetes.
- Walking: If you are newly starting doing it you should start from walking. Slowly over a period of 4-8 weeks you should increase speed and time of your walking. Daily half to one hour of brisk walking is good exercise. It is especially useful if you do it in the morning.
- Jogging: It is good exercise once you have the capacity to do it after walking for a few days.
- Running: It is again a good exercise to develop the capacity of your heart lung machine and also weight loss.
- Cycling is a good exercise if you have problems with your knee joints and you are unable to run.
- Climbing stairs: This is good exercise if you don’t have a place to run or swim.
- Swimming is one of the best exercises if you like and you can do that.
- Other outdoor games like football, basketball, long tennis are good if you can play them daily for an hour.
Healthy food
Unhealthy food is one of the factor that make you obese and diabetic. Following are the steps to follow regarding food to stay healthy. To prevent diabetes:
- Avoid readymade foods: Readymade food contains lots of refined sugars and preservatives and coloring agents that can be harmful for you. You should avoid readymade food and carbonated juices.
- Carbonated drinks and juices contain lot of sugars and salts and they are easily absorbable from intestine to make you obese. Avoid carbonated drinks and sweetened juices.
- Daily eat fruits and green leafy vegetables. They are good in vitamin content and have natural fibres that make your digestion healthy.
- Daily eat a variety of home made food. No food is good if you eat the same daily food for a long period. You should have variety and balanced food.
- With a lot of marketing and advertisements there is confusion about which is good and which is bad. Which oil is good and which is bad. Please note nothing is perfect. You should have a variety of food in adequate quantities.
- Use lean meats in food that help you to avoid excess weight gain and reduce obesity.
- Eat a good amount of freshly prepared salads daily.
Daily physical activities
Apart from daily physical activities it is important for you to be physically active as much as possible.
- Avoid use of lifts or elevators wherever possible. You should use stairs in place of lifts or elevators. It is great physical activity. What you can do is start going up stairs and if you feel fatigue and further it seems not possible to climb then enter lift. This way you can increase your physical capacity in a span of 4-8 weeks.
- Avoid using automobiles for short distances. For distances less than 5 kilometers you should walk of use a bicycle that is great exercise and it also reduces the traffic problem
- Avoid using a washing machine. This is good to wash your clothes daily and whenever possible avoid using washing machines and try to do that manually.
- Get Involved in outdoor games like football and long tennis, swimming and jogging.
- Join your local cyclist groups and go for cycling in groups.
- Go for a trek or hiking if you like it with groups doing these activities.
Stop smoking
Smoking and using tobacco is the biggest factor causing lifestyle diseases. It should be stopped as early as possible.
Smoking makes you psychologically dependent on it; there is no physical dependence.
You need a strong will to quit smoking.
You probably need to change your peer group if they are all smokers.
Avoid alcohol
Drinking too much will cause obesity and related diseases.
Avoid drinking too much alcohol.
The amount of alcohol you drink should be moderated to a limit.
Excess drinking is harmful.
Regular check ups
Visit your doctor regularly and follow the advice on this regard. You can be motivated and get good guidance to stay fit and exercise and have healthy food.
You will come to know about any factor that can be changed to prevent diabetes.
You should get examined yourself periodically from your physician and follow the advice.
If unfortunately you get diabetes this advice will detect it early and will help you to control it early so that you are protected from complications.
So these are some measures that are helpful for you to prevent diabetes type 2 disease. Hope it will be helpful for you.
When we hear about diabetes we mostly think of type 2 diabetes. So nowadays when someone says diabetes it is by default type 2 diabetes mellitus. Nowadays it has become very common ailment and literally every family has someone suffering from type 2 diabetes.
Once you get diabetic it brings a lot of restrictions and morbidities which may affect the way you live. It affects your physical capacity to work and also affects you mentally. Additionally it affects multiple organs of your body.
In the long run diabetes can damage your kidneys, heart, limbs and you may get many more complications like retinal diseases and blindness and stroke.
So once you are sick with disease you need to bear treatment cost for that and also you need to bear treatment cost of its complications.
So, rather than suffering an ailment and its complications it is always better not to get that ailment itself. Here we will discuss some tips about ‘how to prevent diabetes?’
As you may be knowing type 2 diabetes is a multifactorial disease that is caused by many factors. First we will list the factors that can make you diabetic then we will discuss their prevention.
Factors that can cause diabetes type 2
- Obesity
- Sedentary lifestyle
- Inadequate sleep
- Stress
- Hypertension
- Smoking
- Drinking alcohol
- Eating refined sugars and carbs
- No exercise and physical activities
Above list gives the most common factors pushing someone to get diabetes type 2. In the process of type 2 diabetes your body reduces production of insulin or cannot use it efficiently in both the cases your blood sugar rises abnormally high posing you its consequences.
Obesity
Are you overweight or obese? Those who are overweight or obese are more likely to get diabetes and they are affected multiple ways. Obesity is defined by BMI which is body mass index.
Those with BMI more than 27 are considered as obese and bmi is calculated as
BMI = (weight in kgsquare of Height in meters)
Sedentary lifestyle
Sedentary lifestyle is the main cause of lifestyle diseases. Since the time vehicles were invented and we have all the machines from grinding food to washing clothes we have become more and more sedentary.
With a sedentary lifestyle we have got more chances of getting type 2 diabetes.
Inadequate sleep
This is the factor which leads to obesity and stress. The reasons for inadequate sleep can be many like using screens at night or using drugs like tobacco and alcohol, excess use of tea and coffee.
Inadequate sleep can make you susceptible to hypertension and diabetes.
Stress
Stress can be of any type stress of work and you are not able to sleep or get time for physical exercise for this reason, may cause obesity and poses you to increased risk of diabetes and hypertension too.
Hypertension
Hypertension and obesity, diabetes are all lifestyle diseases so many underlying factors causing them are common. You do have increased risk of diabetes type 2 if you have hypertension.
Drinking alcohol
Drinking alcohol in excess makes you more prone for obesity and hypertension. It increases the risk of diabetes type 2. Alcohol should be consumed in moderation or should be avoided.
Smoking
Smoking may be passive or active and may pose you to increased risk of diabetes and hypertension. If you have smoking habits and you have diabetes it increases the chance of getting diabetes related complications like stroke and blindness by manyfold.
Refined sugars
Do you eat readymade food regularly? In recent years food is increasingly prepared by industry. Food produced by industry contains an excess amount of refined sugars and refined carbohydrates. They are responsible for excess weight gain and poses you to increased risk of getting type 2 diabetes.
No exercise and physical activities
Excess workload and not time for physical exercise makes you increasingly susceptible to getting diabetes type 2.
These are some common factors which make you suffer from lifestyle diseases like diabetes and hypertension and obesity.
Now we will discuss what steps you should take to prevent diabetes type 2. We will list those factors first then we will explain them in detail.
Steps to prevent diabetes
- Start right from childhood
- Follow it like a routine
- Daily adequate sleep
- Daily adequate exercise
- Healthy food
- Daily physical activities
- Stop smoking
- Avoid alcohol
- Get regular check ups
Start right from childhood
We get most of our good habits from childhood. Nowadays it should be a focus for everyone to concentrate on their children. Teach them how important is daily exercise and healthy food.
Restrict your children from using screens for more than 1 hour a day. Your children should not spend more than one hour a day in front of TV or video games or mobiles.
Encourage them to play outdoor games daily.
Follow it like a routine
Like you work, eat and sleep daily you should exercise daily and consider it as important activity as eating and sleeping.
Many of us decide to follow a healthy lifestyle but they cannot sustain those for long. You should be motivated to help yourself to prevent diabetes. The strongest motivation comes from inside rather than from someone else.
Daily adequate sleep to prevent diabetes
Do you take sleep adequately? Here we state adequately because sleep requirements can be different for everyone.
For someone 6 hour are adequate and for someone even 10 hours a day is inadequate. The crux of the story is if you wake up fresh and you do not have feelings of fatigue or anxiety while you work then you have good sleep even if it is less in number of hours.
Daily adequate exercise to prevent diabetes
Daily adequate exercise is very important for you to prevent diabetes. Like healthy food and healthy sleeping habits it is very important that you exercise daily.
Following are some steps in details about exercise:
- Make it a routine. Like you eat food daily, make this activity a daily routine. According to your comfort you should decide your time to exercise. Generally doing exercise in the morning is a good habit but if not possible do it when you get time.
- Make it essential. Make it a routine and daily needed essential activity. You will not follow a daily routine unless you make it an essential daily activity. You may join a group of people who exercise daily to stay motivated or maybe you can do it alone as you like.
- Try to do it outdoors. Daily exercise especially in the morning and outdoors help to maintain your sleep wake cycle and also helps to keep you healthy and away from diabetes.
- Walking: If you are newly starting doing it you should start from walking. Slowly over a period of 4-8 weeks you should increase speed and time of your walking. Daily half to one hour of brisk walking is good exercise. It is especially useful if you do it in the morning.
- Jogging: It is good exercise once you have the capacity to do it after walking for a few days.
- Running: It is again a good exercise to develop the capacity of your heart lung machine and also weight loss.
- Cycling is a good exercise if you have problems with your knee joints and you are unable to run.
- Climbing stairs: This is good exercise if you don’t have a place to run or swim.
- Swimming is one of the best exercises if you like and you can do that.
- Other outdoor games like football, basketball, long tennis are good if you can play them daily for an hour.
Healthy food
Unhealthy food is one of the factor that make you obese and diabetic. Following are the steps to follow regarding food to stay healthy. To prevent diabetes:
- Avoid readymade foods: Readymade food contains lots of refined sugars and preservatives and coloring agents that can be harmful for you. You should avoid readymade food and carbonated juices.
- Carbonated drinks and juices contain lot of sugars and salts and they are easily absorbable from intestine to make you obese. Avoid carbonated drinks and sweetened juices.
- Daily eat fruits and green leafy vegetables. They are good in vitamin content and have natural fibres that make your digestion healthy.
- Daily eat a variety of home made food. No food is good if you eat the same daily food for a long period. You should have variety and balanced food.
- With a lot of marketing and advertisements there is confusion about which is good and which is bad. Which oil is good and which is bad. Please note nothing is perfect. You should have a variety of food in adequate quantities.
- Use lean meats in food that help you to avoid excess weight gain and reduce obesity.
- Eat a good amount of freshly prepared salads daily.
Daily physical activities to prevent diabetes
Apart from daily physical activities it is important for you to be physically active as much as possible.
- Avoid use of lifts or elevators wherever possible. You should use stairs in place of lifts or elevators. It is great physical activity. What you can do is start going up stairs and if you feel fatigue and further it seems not possible to climb then enter lift. This way you can increase your physical capacity in a span of 4-8 weeks.
- Avoid using automobiles for short distances. For distances less than 5 kilometers you should walk of use a bicycle that is great exercise and it also reduces the traffic problem
- Avoid using a washing machine. This is good to wash your clothes daily and whenever possible avoid using washing machines and try to do that manually.
- Get Involved in outdoor games like football and long tennis, swimming and jogging.
- Join your local cyclist groups and go for cycling in groups.
- Go for a trek or hiking if you like it with groups doing these activities.
Stop smoking
Smoking and using tobacco is the biggest factor causing lifestyle diseases. It should be stopped as early as possible.
Smoking makes you psychologically dependent on it; there is no physical dependence.
You need a strong will to quit smoking.
You probably need to change your peer group if they are all smokers.
Avoid alcohol
Drinking too much will cause obesity and related diseases.
Avoid drinking too much alcohol.
The amount of alcohol you drink should be moderated to a limit.
Excess drinking is harmful.
Regular check ups to prevent diabetes
Visit your doctor regularly and follow the advice on this regard. You can be motivated and get good guidance to stay fit and exercise and have healthy food.
You will come to know about any factor that can be changed to prevent diabetes.
You should get examined yourself periodically from your physician and follow the advice.
If unfortunately you get diabetes this advice will detect it early and will help you to control it early so that you are protected from complications.
So these are some measures that are helpful for you to prevent diabetes type 2 disease. Hope it will be helpful for you.
disclaimer
This is a general guideline that can help you prevent diabetes. You should consider your doctor’s opinion before taking any decision or meet us in person. As everyone has different health conditions all facts may not be applicable to everyone.
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