Journal of Diabetes and Metabolic Disorders
Volume:7 Issue: 3, 2008

Sedentary life style is considered as a main risk factor for DM-II. The role of regular exercise is appreciated in both primary prevention and treatment. Diabetic people can benefit from physical activity in order to have a better control on blood glucose level, lipid profile, body weight, and blood pressure. Furthermore, psychological improvements may follow such as decreasing anxiety or depression and improvement of sleep quality.
Different kinds of training including aerobic, resistive, and flexibility exercises could be recommended, but some parameters like intensity, duration, and frequency of exercises as well as safety measures should be explained to the patient when prescribing an exercise program.
A thorough medical evaluation is required before starting an unaccustomed exercise program in order to modify it, as needed.
It is recommended that diabetic people participate in moderate aerobic (40-60% Vo2max) and resistive (30-50% 1RM) exercises 3-5 and 2-3 sessions per week, respectively. However, it is a general recommendation, and an expert in exercise therapy should tailor the program with respect to individual conditions.

Hypertension and increased inflammatory markers in type 2 diabetic patients are two major risk factors of cardiovascular diseases. Therefore, management of these two cardiovascular diseases risk factors is of the first magnitude in type 2 diabetic patients. This study was aimed to determine effect of processed Berberis vulgaris on blood pressure and inflammatory markers in type 2 diabetic patients.
Type 2 diabetic patients were recruited into a clinical trial (n =57) and randomly assigned into 3 groups: 1) processed B. vulgaris (n =19), daily consumption of 1 Tsp processed B.vulgaris in apple vinegar, 2) apple vinegar group (n =19), daily consumption of 2 Tsp apple vinegar and 3) control group with no intervention. Nutritional intake, anthropometric indices, inflammatory markers and systolic- and diastolic blood pressure were measured at the baseline and the end of 8th week.
At the end of 8 weeks, mean of nutritional intake, anthropometric indices, hs CRP concentration, systolic- and diastolic blood pressure did not change in processed B.vulgaris, apple vinegar and control groups significantly. Interleukin-6 concentration did not shift in processed B.vulgaris and control groups but in apple vinegar group decreased significantly.
These findings had shown processed B.vulgaris had no effect on systolic- and diastolic blood pressure but apple vinegar had positive effect on interleukin-6. Nevertheless, further investigations about B.vulgaris effect on blood pressure and inflammatory markers are necessary.