Weight Training Improves Diabetic Nerve Function
Fri Jun 4, 5:21 PM ET Add Health - Reuters to My Yahoo!
By Megan Rauscher
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Resistance training improves nerve function in elderly diabetic patients with a common condition called peripheral neuropathy, according to findings presented today at the annual meeting of the American Diabetes Association. It also has a favorable impact on risk factors for heart disease.
Peripheral neuropathy typically affects the feet and hands and can cause a variety of problems including numbness, tingling sensations, pain, and weakness.
"We noticed that many of our elderly diabetic patients were not tolerating traditional medicines used for neuropathy pain or they just weren't working," lead researcher Dr. Regina T. Kurian, from the University of Louisville in Kentucky, told Reuters Health.
"Our results show that resistance training is safe for elderly patients with neuropathy and it can improve their symptoms and increase muscle strength and maybe help prevent some falls," she said.
In the study, 11 elderly diabetic patients with peripheral neuropathy engaged in roughly 30 minutes of supervised resistance training of the lower extremities three times per week for 12 weeks. "This was a pilot study to see if this was doable and to see if we could get some good data --and we did," Kurian said.
Resistance training was associated with improved muscle strength in the calf and hamstring, a reduction in waist circumference, a drop in blood pressure, and an increase in "good" HDL cholesterol.
Resistance training also led to improvements in scores on two standard neuropathy tests.
Based on these results, the investigators suggest considering resistance training in the management of diabetics with peripheral neuropathy.
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=sto...s_diabetes_dc_1
Weight Training Improves Diabetic Nerve Function 
