Balanced Blood Sugar in 12 Weeks
Lowering your blood sugar without diet, exercise, or drugs?
That probably sounds impossible… especially if you feel like balancing your blood sugar is a losing battle with your willpower.
But there’s more to how your body manages blood sugar than how many cookies you eat or how long you walk on the treadmill.
A recent study made this clear. Researchers showed that a simple supplement can do what the most well-intentioned diet or exercise programs often can’t.
It can lower blood sugar into the normal range in just 12 weeks.
In a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial (the best kind), researchers gave 53 folks with prediabetes a supplement combining pre and postbiotics or a placebo for 12 weeks.
Four weeks after they stopped taking the pills, the real supplement had significantly increased alpha diversity (an indicator of gut health) and butyrate-producing bacteria (vital for balancing gut microbiota, modulating immune response, and more).
Their HbA1c (a measure of blood sugar over time) and fasting plasma glucose levels dropped BELOW the threshold for prediabetes.
Prebiotics are food for your gut bacteria. They’re found in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and seeds.
Postbiotics are less well-known. These are the healthy byproducts that are produced as good bacteria ferment prebiotics.
Postbiotics are unsung heroes likely responsible for the healthy benefits typically attributed to probiotics.
The researchers anticipated these good results because they already had data showing that the postbiotic alone has a beneficial effect on gut barrier function and systemic inflammation—both of which are associated with type 2 diabetes.
These results highlight that beyond how much you weigh, your diet impacts your blood sugar and diabetes risk partly because of its effect on your microbiome.
The bottom line is a healthy gut is essential for healthy blood sugar control. So, supporting your belly bugs with plenty of prebiotic- and probiotic-rich foods could help you balance your blood sugar.
P.S. Struggling to lose weight? In the January issue of my newsletter, I explained how to harness the power of a healthy gut to drop the pounds. CLICK HERE to read that if you’re a subscriber or want to become one.
SOURCE:
Beteri, B.; Barone, M.; Turroni, S.; Brigidi, P.; Tzortzis, G.; Vulevic, J.; Sekulic, K.; Motei, D.-E.; Costabile, A. Impact of Combined Prebiotic Galacto-Oligosaccharides and Bifidobacterium breve-Derived Postbiotic on Gut Microbiota and HbA1c in Prediabetic Adults: A Double-Blind, Randomized, Placebo-Controlled Study. Nutrients 2024, 16, 2205.
