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The new case report indicates that the three patients also lost weight and their HbA1C, a measure of blood sugar, improved.
"People are focused on giving drugs to type 2 diabetes, but it's a food illness," said Dr. Jason Fung, author of the study, medical director of the management program Intensive feeding in Toronto.
Experts say this goes against the widespread belief that diabetes is a chronic, irreversible disease – although Fung said it has changed in recent years.
"In general, the concept of inversion or cure of diabetes (…) is not well accepted in the medical field," said Dr. Abhinav Diwan, associate professor of medicine, cell biology and Physiology at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. "It's not even a therapeutic goal when people start treating diabetics."
In the study, patients were fasting 24 hours several times a week. They only dined on fasting days, but could drink water, coffee, and broth all the time. They were all men aged 40, 52 and 67, diagnosed with diabetes 20, 25 and 10 years ago.
This is different from type 1 diabetes, an autoimmune disease in which the pancreas does not produce much or no insulin at all. Fasting for people with type 1 diabetes can be dangerous because of the increased risk of hypoglycemia, said Diwan, who did not participate in the new study.
Regarding this area of research, he said: "These are early, but very exciting." The new report is not a definitive study, he added; he has a small sample, no control group and limited follow-up. It is also difficult to compare existing research on humans because they rely primarily on observations and how to implement fasting has not been standardized, Diwan said.
"It is very clear that people who can lose weight have better control of blood sugar … [and] sometimes they can get rid of insulin if they are not too advanced in their disease, "said Dr. Robert Gabbay, chief physician of the Joslin Diabetes Center, a center for research and care-giving Boston-based nonprofit affiliated with Harvard Medical School.
"The most established example of this type is for people undergoing bariatric surgery," he added. "They lose a lot of weight and some of them stop taking all their medications."
Gabbay, who was not involved in the new report, calls it a "remission" of diabetes rather than a "cure" because, "to our knowledge, it is still worthwhile to undergo an annual eye exam , screening for kidney failure and nervous system damage, even in people who normalize their blood glucose because they run the risk of constant risk. "
"Well, honestly, there are not enough of these people to know."
Experts such as Fung are calling for more research on this topic, which has not received much attention from the broader scientific community.
"Intermittent fasting has been in the backcountry for many, many years and there is really no data on it," said Fung, adding that his proposals for more in-depth studies on fasting and diabetes have been rejected by two hospitals in Toronto.
He said he saw thousands of patients in his program, and the new report, which took two years to be published and includes only three patients, is part of a continuing effort to show the first evidence and advocate for favor of larger studies.
But without randomized trials, says Diwan, it's hard to say how fast intermittent fasting is, what's the best way to do it, and how long-lasting it can be.
At the very least, "intermittent fasting has been practiced in various cultures," said Diwan, citing his own Hindu culture. "So, that tells you right now that it's a doable thing."
"It's clear that you have to be careful because people with diabetes are prone to episodes of hypoglycemia, and hypoglycemia can be fatal," Diwan said. "People do not want to put them at risk by fasting without consulting a doctor."
Mr. Gabbay said the new document achieved its objective, which deserved further study, but that it alone was a success, and that it would be "difficult to draw conclusions from this type of work".
"We are always worried when dramatic results are presented because they may be misinterpreted by people," he said. "In the world of diet and weight loss, things happen quickly."
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