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As a board-certified psychiatrist with 38 years of experience, Jill Abram has been instrumental in helping to heal and restore communities, families, and individuals through direct care and collaboration with other health professionals involved in her client’s care. During those years, she noticed a distinct correlation between the physical condition of both young and elderly patients and the instances of a diabetes diagnosis or pre-diabetic conditions. She has been delighted to discover emerging scientific evidence that strength training can help prevent diabetes and boost health in both young and older populations.
The benefit of strength training
Strength training, also known as resistance exercise, includes several activities that create physical resistance to the body. The force to overcome the resistance causes the muscles to work harder to lift, move, push, rotate, or pull a weight. Calisthenics is a form of strength training that uses the body as the weight to be moved. Also, lifting weights, pulling resistance bands, throwing medicine balls, or curling kettlebells are all examples of using equipment to increase muscle mass by resistance.
Like cardio exercise, strength training can also lower blood pressure and cholesterol levels, which can be problematic, especially for young people and older adults whose diets may not be optimum. However, Jill Abram is interested in the effect of strength training on insulin levels. According to medical studies, a 30% reduction in the rates of type 2 diabetes was discovered in those who performed strength training independent of cardiovascular exercises.
Fitness and glucose connection
Diabetes is characterized by blood cells that are resistant to insulin’s effects. Insulin moves glucose or sugar through the bloodstream and into cells. When glucose transport deteriorates (called insulin resistance), the pancreas has to work extra hard, but eventually, blood sugar levels increase, resulting in Type 2 Diabetes.
Jill Abram, who has served as the psychiatrist at the Homeless Mobile Team and the Midtown Mental Center in Indianapolis, has seen the effect of poor nutrition and the lack of exercise on cognitive functioning and emotional reasoning. Now, she is pleased with how strength training can help manage diabetes, resulting in better health outcomes among the young and the elderly.
By following the research on the connection between physical fitness and glucose levels, it is exciting to observe the many medical conclusions that support a positive connection between fitness and glucose levels. Strength training will not only facilitate weight loss by converting fatty tissue into muscle, but resistance training helps the body respond better to insulin by improving how it uses blood sugar.
While aerobic exercise has always been important to improving heart health and managing type 2 diabetics, research now proves that strength training improves insulin sensitivity, which allows your body to process glucose more efficiently. Also, the blood sugar levels in these patients are regulated for a longer period of time when they choose a regular schedule of strength training over cardiovascular exercises. Often, blood sugar levels are lowered for up to 24 hours after an effective strength training routine.
If you are diabetic or pre-diabetic, Jill Abram suggests checking with your physician to understand what level of resistance training might help improve your blood sugar levels. Strength training can be easily done at home with a minimum of equipment. And, for those trending towards a loss of muscle mass, strength training is the best solution for reversal.
