4 best forms of exercise for people with type 2 diabetes

1. Aerobic exercise is good for people with type 2 diabetes

During aerobic exercise, whether it's moderate activity like walking or more vigorous like running or cycling, your muscles use glucose, the sugar in your blood, to fuel your workout. This lowers your blood sugar and helps your body use insulin better.

AssociationDiabetesThe American Diabetes Association (ADA) recommends that all adults with type 2 diabetes participate in at least 150 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous intensity activities such as walking, running, swimming, or cycling … each week.

For beginners, start slowly, with just 5 to 10 minutes of moderate activity each day until you can gradually increase to 30 minutes/day, most days of the week.

For those who are already in an exercise routine, some interval training can be done, which means performing bursts of high-intensity effort interspersed with recovery periods.

A March 2017 study in the Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports found that interval training can have major benefits for people with diabetes. In the study, people with type 2 diabetes who did four to six 30-second cycling sprints, followed by four minutes of recovery, had better glucose metabolism in their muscles, compared to people who cycled at a moderate intensity for 40 to 60 minutes.

If a diabetic patient has arthritis or neuropathy in the feet, resistance training should be replaced with other activities such as swimming or stationary cycling, walking, etc.

Walking helps stabilize blood sugar levels in people with type 2 diabetes.

2. Strength training

The body stores carbohydrates in the muscles and liver, says Sheri Colberg, MD, a diabetes specialist in the US. If you don't have much muscle, those carbs will "spill" into the blood, raising blood sugar levels or be stored as fat by the body.

Typically, fat is stored in the abdominal area, leading to higher insulin resistance. However, if the body has enough muscle mass, these carbs can go into the muscles and then be used up through aerobic or resistance exercise.

People with diabetes who are at risk of losing muscle strength should do resistance exercise to build muscle mass, which in turn increases insulin sensitivity.

The ADA recommends doing 2-3 strength training sessions per week. When you're just starting out, it's best to just use your body weight as resistance, with moves like planks, lunges, and push-ups.

But if you can do 8 to 12 repetitions without your muscles feeling fatigued, you can use additional resistance bands, hand weights (such as dumbbells), weight machines at the gym, or even simple household items like filled water bottles to increase resistance.

As you weigh more, you use more glycogen, which helps build and strengthen muscle and improves insulin sensitivity.

Lunges with resistance bands strengthen muscles and are good for people with diabetes.

3. Stretching exercises

In people with diabetes, excess glucose in the blood can stick like sugar to the surface of joints, changing the structure of the joint over time, causing the joints and muscles to become brittle and less flexible, making you more susceptible to injury from overuse.

Therefore, regular stretching is key to increasing flexibility in muscles and joints. Stretching immediately after exercise is often easiest and makes it easier to remember to do.

Stretching exercises

4. Mindfulness

Mindfulness-based exercises like yoga and tai chi have been shown to help people with type 2 diabetes. This is because these forms of exercise promote physical activity, which helps reduce stress, which has been shown to aggravate type 2 diabetes.

A September 2018 review in the American Journal of Endocrinology and Metabolism concluded that yoga can be an effective tool when it comes to controlling blood sugar levels and may also help treat other related conditions like high blood pressure.

While there are no official guidelines for mindfulness-based activities, the ADA recommends flexibility and balance training — including yoga and tai chi — two to three times a week.

Yoga is a suitable sport for people with diabetes.

5. Tips for safe exercise with diabetes

Monitor your blood sugar levels before, during and after exercise. Take proper care of your feet such as wearing socks made of absorbent material to keep your feet dry, wearing shoes that fit well, checking for wounds, ulcers or injuries on your feet… Pay proper attention to your hands such as wearing gloves to avoid calluses and skin tears. Do not ignore any health conditions other than diabetes such as high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, arthritis… to adjust your exercise routine accordingly. Consult your doctor before starting to exercise to know your health condition and ability to exercise in order to adjust your treatment accordingly.

If you are not used to exercising and have diabetes-related complications such as high blood pressure, neuropathy or retinopathy, talk to your doctor before starting any exercise program./.