3 New Diabetes Studies, in Brief
Findings: a heart-healthy lifestyle reduces DM risk; 1 egg a day may protect against T2DM; and a new genetic risk score may improve DM diagnosis.
We review in brief 3 new studies that found: following heart health guidelines also reduces diabetes risk; eating 1 egg a day may lower the risk of type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM) in middle-aged men; and, a new risk score is far more effective for diagnosis of type 1 diabetes and newborn screening. Click through the slides above for an at-a-glance look.
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Study 1. An Egg a Day Keeps Diabetes at Bay. Blood samples of men who eat 1 egg a day include certain lipid molecules that positively correlate with the blood profile of men who remain free of type 2 DM, found authors of a new study published in December in Molecular Nutrition and Food Research.
Study 1. Mean Egg Intake. Using metabolic profiling, serum samples of 239 men were analyzed in four groups: those with higher (mean intake one egg per day) or lower (mean intake two eggs per week) egg intake who developed type 2 DM or remained healthy (controls) during a mean followâup of 19.3 years. Higher baseline tyrosine level predicts higher odds of type 2 DM along with an unknown hexoseâcontaining compound. Certain predominant metabolites in type 2 DM cases were positively correlated with ones in the lower egg intake group and negatively with ones in the higher egg intake group.
Study 1. Clinical Implications. “Although it is too early to draw any causal conclusions, we now have some hints about certain egg-related compounds that may have a role in type 2 DM development. Further detailed investigations with both cell models and intervention studies in humans that use modern techniques, such as metabolomics, are needed to understand the mechanisms behind physiological effects of egg intake,” said lead author Stefania Noerman of the University of Eastern Finland in a statement.
Source: Noerman S, Karkkainen O, Mattsson A, et al. Metabolic profiling of high egg consumption and the associated lower risk of type 2 diabetes in middle-aged Finnish men. Mol Nutr Food Res. 2018 Dec 12:e1800605. doi: 10.1002/mnfr.201800605.
Study 2. More Ideal Heart Health Factors Lowers DM Risk. Higher levels of ideal cardiovascular health lead to a lower risk of dose-dependent diabetes, particularly among people with normal fasting glucose at baseline. Results of the new study, reported in Diabetologia, were published online on January 15, 2019.
Study 2. No DM at Baseline. The study used the American Heart Association’s Life’s Simple 7 as a guide for measuring heart health among the group. Baseline cholesterol, blood pressure, diet, smoking, physical activity and body mass index were used to categorize participants based on the number of ideal cardiovascular health components. A total of 891 incident diabetes cases were noted. Those who had normal glucose levels who attained four or more guideline factors had an 80% lower risk of developing diabetes. Those who already had diabetes or prediabetes and met four of the factors had no change in lowering their risk for diabetes.
Study 2. Clinical Implications. “Healthy people need to work to stay healthy. Follow the guidelines. Don’t proceed to high blood sugar and then worry about stopping diabetes. By that point, people need high-intensity interventions that focus on physical activity and diet to promote weight loss and, possibly, medications to lower the risk of diabetes,” said lead author Joshua J. Joseph, MD, assistant professor at Ohio State Wexner Medical Center, in a statement.
Source: Joseph JJ, BEnnett A, Echouffo Tcheugui JB, et al. Ideal cardiovascular health, glycaemic status and incident type 2 diabetes mellitus: the REasons for Geographic and Racial Differences in Stroke (REGARDS) study. Diabetologia. 2019;62:426-437. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00125-018-4792-y
Study 3. Improved Type 1 MD Risk Score. An improved type 1 diabetes genetic risk score is highly useful for classifying adult incident diabetes type and improving newborn screening, a finding reported in the February 2018 issue of Diabetes Care.
Study 3. T1D GRS2. An analysis of variants associated with type 1 diabetes both in the HLA region and across the genome included 6,481 cases and 9,247 controls from the Type 1 Diabetes Genetics Consortium. Interactions between variants marking strongly associated HLA haplotypes were modeled and odds ratios were generated to create the improved genetic risk score, called the T1D GRS2. The T1D GRS2 used 67 single nucleotide polymorphisms and accounted for interactions between 18 HLA DR-DQ haplotype combinations. In simulated newborn screening, the T1D GRS2 was nearly twice as efficient as HLA genotyping alone and 50% better than current genetic scores in general population type 1 diabetes prediction.
Study 3. Clinical Implications. “Prediction of what diseases we might get in the future is an important area, and type 1 diabetes has a strong genetic element that we are now able to measure very well. Measurement of the type 1 diabetes genetic risk score could help predict who will develop the condition from early life could help with research into potential early life interventions, and with classifying diabetes correctly at diagnosis,” said senior author Richard Oram, PhD, of the University of Exeter in Exeter, United Kingdom, in a statement.
Source: Sharp SA, et al. Development and standardization of an improved type 1 diabetes genetic risk score for use in newborn screening and incident diagnosis. Diabetes Care. 2019;42:200-207. doi: 10.2337/dc18-1785.
