CBGM's The good the bad the BS!
I don't know about you but every day I'm being bombarded by adverts for CBGM's (Continuous blood glucose monitors). The adverts are compelling which makes me pause to think am I missing out on something? Can they revolutionise my understanding of nutrition to help you get even more out of yours?
Let's talk about who and why they can help the most. If you are type 1 or 2 diabetic and have issues with controlling blood sugar levels.
Diabetes
Type 1. The pancreas makes little to no insulin which means the body struggles to control blood glucose.
Type 2. Dysfunction in the fat cells, mitochondria, and beta cells of the pancreas brought on by obesity.
The use of CBGM's to help people make better decisions about food, meal and portion control, and improving blood glucose markers across the day especially if people are not well educated about diet and food is clearly beneficial.
But what about people without diabetes? Why use them?
When it comes to diet to control weight and body fatness CBGM companies are drilling into us that sugar, carbohydrate and Insulin is BAD. At all times we need to be wary of raising blood sugar because when we push Insulin up we can't lose body fat!
Is that true?
Here's the thing! When you overeat carbohydrates and food you keep insulin high pushing the body to store excess energy. When you put yourself into a calorie deficit you transition from a fed state to a fasted state. In a fasted state, even when carbohydrates are very high from meals and snacks Insulin drops. Weight control is NOT an Insulin issue when you are in a fasted state/calorie deficit. Carbohydrates and Insulin are not the bad guys here. Overconsumption of food and calories is.
But it's NOT just about calories!
I've said this many times. Weight management is more than calories. However, calories are the foundation of the road map in making sure you are on the right path when aiming to control weight.
What matters outside calories?
Eating Mindfully
Creating a food environment in the kitchen and at home that helps you keep on track
Meal planning your week
Taking self-responsibility for your habits and decisions around food, treats and alcohol
Setting targets to help you stick to your goals
Understanding calories in food and portion control
Understanding your own hunger cues and eating foods that manage them
Learning delayed food gratification
These are a few of the self-improvement actions I can think of (that we've discussed here at VPCC). These take time to learn, most people don't spend any valuable time on the aforementioned preferring to look for that quick "hack: because it's easier. I want you to ask yourself from the bullet list above have you actioned any of these???
There is a side of CBGM companies that worries me the most. People who already have a disproportionate relationship with food will use these to back up their own bias. Villifying Insulin, sugar, and carbs and creating fear over the natural ebb and flow of blood glucose hikes around meal times is bad enough, encouraging people to eat whole food groups in a specific time frame for "glycemic control" in my mind is creating a nutritional paranoia that simply does not need to exist.
There are other outlandish claims by CBGM companies NOT backed up by evidence such as stool and gut biome markers. Why? because what's in your stool doesn't accurately reflect the true inner colonic microbiome. The facts don't add up for pinpointing your gut health or prescribing accurate diets this way!
The hype is HUGE when it comes to CBGM's. I feel we have to be very wary of any company that produces its own one-sided set of data to support its growth. We need to think more critically about what's being pumped out on social media, podcasts, advertorials in papers and magazines. Just last week I was tagged into a post in the Times that was riddled with horrendous information interspersed with firm facts about menopause and nutrition. In my mind, this is the most dangerous form of information which, intentional or not; causes misunderstanding of what is fact. This is why we need to be constantly on guard, do our own research, and homework and not trust anything we read from mainstream papers.
So, are CBGM's a good or a bad thing for the general public? I'll let you decide but here's a great quote from a very clever Nutritionist with a doctorate in sports nutrition.
"Just because you can doesn't mean you should"
Laurent Bannock
Thanks for reading, Simon
2 X Winner of Gym Based PT, and founder of VPCC
Further Reading:
Calorie for calorie, dietary fat restriction results in more body fat loss than carbohydrate restriction:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4603544/
Impact of short-term high-fat feeding on glucose and insulin
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2697306/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5291812/
Comparison of fecal matter and blood metabolome reveals inconsistent associations of the gut microbiota:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9894915/
Role of leptin and ghrelin in the loss of body weight caused by low fat, high carbohydrate diet:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12679442/
The growing use of continuous glucose monitors in people without diabetes - an evidence-free ZONE:
https://wchh.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/pdi.2475?fbclid=IwAR0ajcyFnnJVNOLuf7I1A-uE-SfMe-9pRtYEhhvbcu9Sd_48uvzavZQfUQI
https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/is-blood-sugar-monitoring-without-diabetes-worthwhile-202106112473
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666970622000191
ISSN Position Stand of diet and body composition:
https://jissn.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12970-017-0174-y
Sigma Nutrition CBGM and Change Nutrition Science:
https://sigmanutrition.com/episode500/
Insulin - an undeserved bad reputation:
https://weightology.net/insulin-an-undeserved-bad-reputation/
https://weightology.net/insulin-an-undeserved-bad-reputation-the-biggest-insulin-myth-continued/