Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus (Type 2 DM) is one of the fastest rising medical diagnoses in the United States with consequences of hogging up more and more medical resources due to its contributory cause of other medical problems including peripheral vascular disease, heart disease, renal failure, and cancer. However, Type 2 DM is a lifestyle based medical condition that can be improved or even reverse into remission through lifestyle changes. One such changes is through quality eating.

Multiple studies have shown that a whole food, plant-based (WFPB) diet can reverse diabetes or at least improve it, depending on how far along the disease is. However, further investigations of a WFPB diet effect on Type 2 DM is still much needed. In a study published in journal Diabetes Research and Clinical Practice, researchers compared the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet to a WFPB diet.

The study was small with 15 diabetic participants that were enrolled into a 4-week trial. On week one, participants’s baseline was measured on their regular diet including insulin usage, cholesterol, urinary glucose, and CRP. Then participants went through one week of each diet: DASH 1, WFPB, and DASH 2. Participants were allowed to eat ad libitum for each diet so long as they met the requirements of each diet. Repeat labs were done with each diet phase.

They found that both WFPB and DASH diets improved cardiometabolic markers in diabetics. Daily insulin usage decreased by 24%, 39%, and 30% after DASH 1, WFPB, and DASH 2, respectively. However, they also found that WFPB diet also decreased insulin resistance and improved insulin sensitivity better than the DASH diets with resistance being 40% lower and sensitivity 38% higher. Other markers also improved in the WFPB diet better than DASH diets, including total, LDL, and HDL cholesterol, urinary glucose, Leptin, and CRP levels. These improvements worsened when the participants started their DASH 2 diet phase.

The WFPB diet is a powerful tool in reversing diabetes that plague millions in the United States. The inconvenience and cost of diabetes need not exist if patients switch to a WFPB diet. This study also demonstrated how quickly the benefits of a WFPB diet can take effect.

TM Campbell et al. The acute effects of a DASH diet and whole food, plant-based diet on insulin requirements and related cardiometabolic markers in individuals with insulin-treated type 2 diabetes. Diabetes Research and Clinical Practice. 2023. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.diabres.2023.110814