Everyone understands the damaging nature of sugar today. People actively avoid sugar in all its forms and use alternative sweeteners as a “healthy” substitute. This appears to be a double-edged sword. We are the premier acupuncture clinic in the Tampa Bay area and has been informing patients to avoid all non-caloric artificial sweeteners for years. Usually, any product touted as “non-caloric” or “low-fat” has a terrible dark side and we are finally learning what NAS dark side is.
The double edge sword rears its head in how NAS affect metabolic pathways for glucose tolerance (sugar tolerance). Individuals at risk for diabetes who consumed artificially sweetened drinks compared to sugar-sweetened beverages had a profoundly increased risk for diabetes. This seems counterintuitive since artificial sweeteners are non-caloric. So why does this occur?
The gut microbiome has a profound influence on the health of the entire body. The three bacteria found to be most prevalent in diabetic and pre-diabetic patients was: Blautia, Serratia, and Akkermansia bacteria. Whether NAS are feeding the population of these bacteria or simply disrupting the bacteria that counterbalances them is unstudied. However, it is clear that NAS has no place in the human diet as they will disrupt the gut microbiome and as we continue to learn, this has a huge impact on many aspects of human health.
As Tampa Bays premiere acupuncture clinic we work to address these underlying issues with patients by correcting the bacterial load in the gastrointestinal tract while helping to determine the underlying culprits, like NAS.
When thinking about diabetes remember that acupuncture has been used effectively with supplementation to help normalize blood sugar levels without insulin. With the proper probiotic supplementation and other gut building supplements, our acupuncture clinic has assisted hundreds in resolving debilitating health issues.
Dr Duke Mansell
Sources:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4674628/
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v514/n7521/full/nature13793.html