From diabetesincontrol.com
Can a vegan diet that is no meat or dairy products stomp type 2 diabetes…
Vegan diets have gained a lot of popularity around the world, mostly in America. About 6% of Americans claim that they are vegans. That is a 600% increase in veganism from 2017 to 2021. There are many reasons that people nowadays are adopting a vegan diet and it includes health and ethical reasons. One of the health reasons that this review refers to is type 2 diabetes. There have been previous studies of what a vegan diet has on the health and the prevention of metabolic syndrome. There have been studies that showed that the risk of cancer can be reduced on a vegan diet, but is still under debate that this is the main reason for it. The review aimed to show studies between vegan diets and see if there is a reduction in risk for type 2 diabetes.
The study used a PRISMA research protocol in which they systematically conducted electronic searches in medical library databases in the past till May 2020. The researchers considered all observational studies such as cross-sections or prospective studies and randomized controlled studies. They picked studies with healthy adults or individuals with type 2 diabetes in randomized controlled studies, compared between a vegan diet comported to a diet including meat, meat products, and poultry. The outcome of the studies would include the prevalence or incidence of type 2 diabetes, concerning fasting blood glucose and A1C.
The included studies were independently assessed by three reviewers. In the studies that observational studies that showed the prevalence of t2d among vegans, 60,000 subjects which were 22,434 were men and 38,469 were women. Type 2 diabetes prevalence was higher among nonvegetarians (7,6%) than among the various forms of vegetarianism. Vegans were noted to have a BMI less than omnivores, which was a difference of (23.6 kg/m2vs 28.8 kg/m2, respectively). Vegans had a reduced risk of t2d (Odds Ratio (OR) 0.51, 95 percent confidence interval (CI) 0.40-0.66) than non-vegetarians.
Another group of studies showed the incidence rate of t2d among vegans. The participants included 40,000 people (15,200 men and 26,187 women) free of DM at baseline. In both Non-black and black participants, the vegan diet was found to be protective against the development of t2d (OR 0.429, 95 percent CI 0.249-0.740, and OR 0.381, 95 percent CI 0.236-0.617, respectively).
A group of studies evaluated the risk factors for diabetes-related complications. Vegans have reported that they noticed a significant reduction in BMI from 0.4kg/m2 to 2.4kg/m2. In the control group, there was a reduction from 0.1kg/m2 to 1.5kg/m2. Another factor that was played was blood pressure, systolic blood pressure, cholesterol, and triglyceride all showed favoured significance to a vegan diet. Also, some studies showed renal function was statistically significant, wasn’t much of a difference of decline or betterment of renal function.
As the studies were showed that participants were seeing a better outlook with vegan diets the primary limitations of the included observation studies are that the diet evaluations were self-reported and that dietary habits may not be sustained over time in cross-sectional research. Although the duration of the vegan diet intervention ranged from 6 to 74 weeks, all randomized controlled studies indicated a reduction in A1c levels after the vegan diet.
Limitations existed with the vegan diet and those included nutritional deficiencies, such as proteins, Vitamin B12, calcium, Vitamin D, Iron, Zinc, or Omega-3 fatty acids. All vegans need to get all essential nutrients, which can cause other issues in the body later on in life. One major issue would be the lack of vitamin D and calcium to maintain healthy bones and preventing osteoporosis. It was reported that vegans do have a higher risk of lower bone mineral density. The risk for fracture is high and gets worse when the patient ages. So even with the vegan diet, it is important to supplement their diet to prevent complications.
Overall, we may infer that a vegan diet is related to decreased type 2 diabetes prevalence and incidence in many large observational studies, although it is difficult to tell whether the beneficial effects are due to a vegan diet alone or a healthy lifestyle. The vegan diet may be considered to the American diet and is comparable to other recommended healthy diets such as the Mediterranean, and DASH diets. More studies of controlled studies are needed to show the true effectiveness and safe diet for patients with diabetes.
Clinical pearls
- Vegan diets are a great alternative to typical American diet.
- Vegan diet can lower your risk for type 2 diabetes.
- Vegan diets are efficient but have limitations such as nutritional deficiencies such as Vitamin B12.
- Pollakova, A. Andreadi. The impact of vegan diet in the prevention and treatment of type 2 diabetes: A systematic review. US national library of medicine June 2021
Idris Aderoju, Pharm.D. Candidate, Florida A&M University
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