Washington, October 20 (ANI): Daily sessions of whole-body vibration may prevent the onset of diabetes in the youth, dramatically reducing inflammation, average blood glucose levels and symptoms such as frequent urination, a new study has suggested.
In mice that mimic over-eating adolescents headed toward diabetes, 20 minutes of daily vibration for eight weeks restored a healthy balance of key pro- and anti-inflammatory mediators and was better than prescription drugs at reducing levels of hemoglobin A1c, the most accurate indicator of average blood glucose levels, said Dr. Jack C. Yu, Chief of the Section of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery at the Medical College of Georgia at Georgia Health Sciences University.
In normal mice, just four days of vibration also dramatically improved the ability to manage a huge glucose surge similar to that following a high-calorie, high-fat meal.
"It's a very good sign," said Yu.
"If you eat a pound of sugar, your blood glucose will go up. If you are prediabetic, it will go up even more and take longer to come down."
Interestingly, vibration did not produce similar changes in older, normal mice, Yu told researchers at the Third World Congress of Plastic Surgeons of Chinese Descent.
"This is our model: the average American teenager who eats too much," said Yu, who regularly operates on obese and often prediabetic adolescent males who want their abnormally large breasts reduced.
"The only way to burn fat is to exercise. We shake the bone for you rather than the body's muscle shaking it. This is a highly efficient way to fool the bone into thinking we are exercising."
It's also one way to deal with the reality that many individuals simply will not exercise regularly, he said.
Yu, also a craniofacial surgeon who studies bone formation, said while it's unclear exactly how vibration produces these desirable results, it seems linked to the impact of movement on bone health. (ANI)
