Type 2 diabetes is a common disease, affecting 10% of the adult world population, in which heredity and being overweight are known risk factors.
In a study from Karolinska Institutet, scientists found that women and men with a predisposition to diabetes have different risk factors forecasting type 2 diabetes and prediabetes.
The team found in healthy women, low level of the fat tissue protein adiponectin was a strong predictor of type 2 diabetes and prediabetes in the future.
In healthy men, instead, a low level of the liver protein IGFBP-1, was a strong predictor of type 2 diabetes and prediabetes.
This means that these proteins, which are measures of insulin sensitivity in adipose tissue (adiponectin) and liver and muscle (IGFBP-1), can predict whether one has a high risk of getting type 2 diabetes in 10 years.
A previous study showed gender differences in the same direction.
In men with prediabetes, the risk of future type 2 diabetes was significantly reduced if they increased their physical activity and muscle mass.
In contrast, the same study showed that women with prediabetes must avoid increasing waist circumference and belly fat or reducing large waist circumference to prevent type 2 diabetes.
The current study explains why this gender difference was seen when it came to preventive lifestyles.
It may also explain why regular exercise among abdominal obese women is not enough to reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes.
The team says they had previously shown that waist circumference was a strong independent predictor of type 2 diabetes in women.
They now were able to show that it was linked to reduced production of adiponectin, a protein/hormone produced in the adipose tissue to, among other things, protect against cell stress.
Other studies in both humans and mice have shown that both high normal levels of adiponectin and high normal levels of the liver protein IGFBP-1 prevent getting type 2 diabetes.
If you care about diabetes, please read studies about the real cause of inflammation in type 2 diabetes, and newly identified third type of diabetes is being wrongly diagnosed as type 2.
For more information about nutrition, please see recent studies that blueberries strongly benefit people with metabolic syndrome, and results showing vitamin D could improve blood pressure in people with diabetes.
The study was conducted by Kerstin Brismar et al and published in the journal Frontiers in Endocrinology.
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