the-psoriasis-treatment

One common outcome of doing glycogen-depleting exercise (e.g., strength training, sprinting) in combination with intermittent fasting is an increase in growth hormone (GH) levels. See this post for a graph showing the acute effect on GH levels of glycogen-depleting exercise. This effect applies to both men and women, and is generally healthy, leading to improvements in mood and many health markers. It is a bit like GH therapy, with GH being “administered” to you by your own body. Both glycogen-depleting exercise and intermittent fasting increase GH levels; apparently they have an additive effect when done together. Still, a complaint that one sees a lot from people who have been doing glycogen-depleting exercise and intermittent fasting for a while is that their fasting blood glucose levels go up. This is particularly true for obese folks (after they lose body fat), as obesity tends to be associated with low GH levels, although it is not restricted to the obese. In fact, many people d...

Blood glucose levels in birds are often 2-4 times higher than those in mammals of comparable size. Yet birds often live 3 times longer than mammals of comparable size. This is paradoxical. High glucose levels are generally associated with accelerated senescence, but birds seem to age much slower than mammals. Several explanations have been proposed for this, one of which is related to the formation of advanced glycation endproducts (AGEs). Glycation is a process whereby sugar molecules “stick” to protein or fat molecules, impairing their function. Glycation leads to the formation of AGEs, which seem to be associated with a host of diseases, including diabetes, and to be implicated in accelerated aging (or “ageing”, with British spelling). The graphs below, from Beuchat & Chong (1998), show the glucose levels (at rest and prior to feeding) and HbA1c levels (percentage of glycated hemoglobin) in birds and mammals. HbA1c is a measure of the degree of glycation of hemoglobin, a protein...

Postprandial glucose levels are the levels of blood glucose after meals. In Western urban environments, the main contributors to elevated postprandial glucose are foods rich in refined carbohydrates and sugars. While postprandial glucose levels may vary somewhat erratically , they are particularly elevated in the morning after breakfast. The main reason for this is that breakfast, in Western urban environments, is typically very high in refined carbohydrates and sugars. HbA1c, or glycated hemoglobin, is a measure of average blood glucose over a period of a few months. Blood glucose glycates (i.e., sticks to) hemoglobin, a protein found in red blood cells. Red blood cells are relatively long-lived, lasting approximately 3 months. Thus HbA1c (given in percentages) is a good indicator of average blood glucose levels, if you don’t suffer from anemia or a few other blood abnormalities. Based on HbA1c, one can then estimate his or her average blood glucose level for the previous 3 months or ...

I love statistics. But statistics is the science that will tell you that each person in a group of 20 people ate half a chicken per week over six months, until you realize that 10 died because they ate nothing while the other 10 ate a full chicken every week. Statistics is the science that will tell you that there is an “association” between these two variables: my weight from 1 to 20 years of age, and the price of gasoline during that period. These two variables are indeed highly correlated, by neither has influenced the other in any way. This is why I often like to see the underlying numbers when I am told that such and such health measure on average is this or that, or that this or that disease is associated with elevated consumption of whatever. Statistical results must be interpreted carefully. Lying with statistics is very easy. A case in point is that of blood glucose variations among normal individuals. Try plotting them on graphs. What do you see? A chaotic mess, even when the...

I have recently read an interesting study by Yashin and colleagues (2009) at Duke University’s Center for Population Health and Aging. (The full reference to the article, and a link, are at the end of this post.) This study is a gem with some rough edges, and some interesting implications. The study uses data from the Framingham Heart Study (FHS). The FHS, which started in the late 1940s, recruited 5209 healthy participants (2336 males and 2873 females), aged 28 to 62, in the town of Framingham, Massachusetts. At the time of Yashin and colleagues’ article publication, there were 993 surviving participants. I rearranged figure 2 from the Yashin and colleagues article so that the two graphs (for females and males) appeared one beside the other. The result is shown below (click on it to enlarge); the caption at the bottom-right corner refers to both graphs. The figure shows the age-related trajectory of blood glucose levels, grouped by lifespan (LS), starting at age 40. As you can see fro...