Is blood sugar alone enough for diabetes? Insulin resistance is the earlier signal

My fasting glucose and HbA1c are both perfectly normal, so diabetes is nowhere near me!

But is that really true?

Diabetes is a disease everyone has heard of, yet many people's understanding stops at fasting glucose and HbA1c testing. To understand diabetes fully, though, we have to recognize that insulin function is the most critical piece.

Let us start with why the pancreas matters. The pancreas contains a special structure called the islets, within which the beta cells secrete a hormone called insulin. Its job is to keep your blood sugar within the normal range. The trouble begins when insulin resistance appears!

So what is insulin resistance? It means your body's cells respond less well to insulin, so glucose cannot be moved into the cells properly and your blood sugar ends up rising. To compensate, your pancreas has to keep secreting more and more insulin, which can eventually exhaust it to the point where it stops producing insulin altogether. That is the root of diabetes — the pancreas going on strike.

And how does insulin resistance develop? A range of factors contribute: excess body fat, unhealthy eating habits, lack of exercise, prolonged high-stress environments, hormonal imbalance, age, poor lifestyle habits, smoking and excessive drinking. It is worth noting that in the early stages of insulin resistance, fasting glucose very often remains within the normal range, which makes it easy to overlook. From a functional medicine perspective, that is why testing insulin function at the same time is so necessary.

As your insulin resistance increases, a series of problems follows: weight climbing (particularly fat accumulating around the abdomen), being unable to lose weight despite careful dieting, persistent fatigue, irritability, mood swings, and even darkening of the skin in the armpits, the back of the neck, body folds and under the breasts. But do not worry — the good news is that insulin resistance does not have to be for life, and you can improve it through lifestyle adjustments.

If you do not take action, however, insulin resistance can gradually lead to a series of chronic conditions, including type 2 diabetes, metabolic syndrome, cardiovascular disease, polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), inflammatory conditions, certain cancers and neurological disease.

Lowering insulin resistance is therefore vital to protecting your endocrine health. It not only helps stabilize blood sugar but reduces the risk of all the chronic conditions above. Through nutritional support, adjusting dietary habits, building exercise into daily life, improving sleep, managing stress, quitting smoking and cutting out alcohol, you can start to beat insulin resistance, keep your pancreas healthy and extend how long it serves you.

"Getting on top of diabetes starts with understanding insulin function"

References:

[1]HOMA estimated insulin resistance as a marker for angiographic severity of coronary artery disease in non-diabetic and non-obese patients Caspian J Intern Med. 2023 Summer; 14(3): 495–506. doi: 10.22088/cjim.14.3.495