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In a recent paper published in _Frontiers in Nutrition_, Francois and colleagues (2017) hypothesize that a combination of lifestyle interventions including a carbohydrate restricted diet and high-intensity interval training (a form of exercise) are a promising approach for treating Type 2 Diabetes.
Their paper summarizes evidence that comes in support of this theory. From the paper, with respect to low-carb:
_"It has long been known that a diet high in carbohydrate elevates postprandial hyperglycemia and insulin responses, together accelerating the progression of T2D and atherosclerotic CVD (18–20). To this end, diets low in carbohydrate was recommended for T2D in 1800s and during the early twentieth century._
_More recently, low-carbohydrate diets are recognized in the ADA medical nutrition therapy guidelines (21) although the official dietary guidelines for individuals with T2D still do not advocate a low-carbohydrate approach."_ [[source](https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnut.2017.00049/full)]
It may be of common sense to many people, including myself, that a condition whose effects are high blood sugar and impaired insulin response would benefit from reducing dietary carbohydrate for as long as needed until a certain/complete insulin sensitivity is restored and insulin secretion is normalized.
The conventional approach for T2D in most countries emphasizes insulin administration to counter the effects of high-blood sugar, while much less emphasis is put onto diet interventions. It's not like doctors give you green light to eat all to sugar you can and inject insulin, but somehow many seem to fail to make the connection reducing dietary carbohydrate as a benefit to this condition.
Lower dietary carbohydrate is a powerful enough strategy alone for many patients to significantly reduce blood sugar and help improve insulin sensitivity. Some patients with more advanced stages of the disease benefit from drugs like metformin and insulin injections in combination with low-carb especially until some degree of insulin sensitivity is achieved. More often than not, if they adhere to low-carb diets over the long term, many patients stop having to administer insulin as well as drugs to lower blood sugar.
Pair a low-carb diet with some form of exercise, like HIIT in this case, and your chances of success to counter T2D with lifestyle interventions alone grow significantly. I'd have to emphasize that adhering and remaining consistent with these approaches represents a big challenge to many people these, one of the reason being the food-rich environment in which we live.
I'm not going to blame anyone or call for conspiracies like Big Pharma or the food industry, or etc. Ultimately, players in this field are for-profit companies and their ultimate goal is to maximize shareholder's wealth, not the wellbeing of the consumer (although this would be an ethical thing to do).
It lies in each individuals responsibility to educate themselves to better their health. Those who are more knowledgeable should help those who lack the knowledge. Doctors sometimes cannot keep up with research and are very often constrained by the burden of their work, while some other times they have to perform their job hands-tight. It's kindof a very ugly circle in my opinion...
I guess I went astray with my personal comments but this is something that I'm really interested in. In one line, I think it's safe to say that reducing carbohydrate and adopting some form of exercise helps with the management of conditions like Type 2 Diabetes.
Those who are interested in reading the details of the paper published by Francois et al. (2017), you can follow the link for the full paper:
<center>[Low-Carb + HIIT for Metabolic Disease - [Research]](https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnut.2017.00049/full)</center>
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[Cristi Vlad](http://cristivlad.com) Self-Experimenter and Author