Type 2 Diabetes

Type 2 diabetes is also known as end-stage insulin resistance. The problem with current practices within medicine is that the correct tests to pick diabetes up at an early stage are not being done.

It is possible to be pre-diabetic for a decade or longer before you receive a diagnosis of type 2 diabetes because typically health services only check a fasting glucose. 

Meanwhile you will have been living with high levels of insulin for all of those years. You do not develop type 2 diabetes until your insulin sensitivity fails after years of living with hyperinsulinaemia. When your body's insulin sensitivity fails completely, this is when blood glucose rises and you can be diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. 

Having insulin resistance worsens outcomes across many mental health diagnoses and reversing insulin resistance can restore response to treatment. 

If you have bipolar disorder this is a major issue in both rapid-cycling bipolar disorder and progression of symptoms over time. Study here. 

In fact living with insulin resistance appears to predict progression of symptoms in bipolar disorder, partly because it appears to impair the blood-brain-barrier, the brain’s protective mechanism. Study here. 

There is also a bidirectional relationship between depression and type 2 diabetes, meaning if you have one diagnosis you are at greater risk of developing the other. 

Did you know that it is possible to reverse type 2 diabetes? Dr Rachel has helped a number of colleagues reverse their new diagnosis of type 2 diabetes without needing to resort to medication. 

You can read more about the evidence for this from the following publication, found here.