It's not unusual that diabetes is thought of as one of the most deadly diseases that we're living with today. Diabetes is the primary cause of blindness among adults in the U.S.. Thousands of people are blinded each year because of this disease. Hundreds of thousands of limb amputations have been performed on diabetic patients in order to save their lives. Most of the patients in hospitals that are waiting for liver transplants, need the transplant because diabetes has ravaged their own. And, diabetes, left untreated, can lead to impotency, nerve loss, hypertension, and many more serious diseases.
In the normal course of events, when a person is told by his doctor that he has diabetes, his doctor will prescribe one or more pharmaceutical drugs to help them control their disease. But many people are looking for natural diabetes cures as well. Here are a few that have been used through the centuries:
Bitter gourd - this is a tropical plant, also known as bitter melon or kerela. Originally grown in Southeast Asia, China, and Africa. You can find it in most health stores. Some health articles recommend taking one tablespoon of bitter gourd daily, on an empty stomach, to reduce your blood glucose levels. Alternatively, you can cook it and eat it as a vegetable along with your meal.
Cinnamon - the dried and ground bark has been used as a natural diabetes treatment for centuries. Diabetics have trouble processing the glucose in their body. In trials, cinnamon seems to help the body's fat cells utilize the glucose in the bloodstream which is why it appears to be so effective. Anything that helps the body to process glucose will be beneficial in normalizing blood glucose levels.
Chromium supplements - some health experts theorize that the soil used to grow crops today is severely deficient in many of the trace elements that used to naturally reside in the earth. One of these is chromium, which in some tests has shown to provide diabetes patients with substantial improvement from their diabetes symptoms. Chromium is believed to help the body produce insulin as well as to help the insulin already in the body to perform at a greater level of efficiency. As of today, however, there has been no government regulated trials to test the effectiveness of chromium on diabetes.
Kino - This medicinal herb has been used in Indian medicines for diabetes treatment for a long time as a treatment for diabetes.
Exercise - type 2 diabetes has become a real epidemic in this country. Many health experts lay the problem directly on the combination of them eating too much fast foods and lack of exercise. A theory, that many doctors subscribe to, is that too much body fat leads to diabetes in those that have a family history of diabetes. They believe that it is something about the excess fat that triggers the inability of the body to produce insulin or to use that insulin to process the foods they eat.
There's no doubt that tested pharmaceutical drugs are effective in treating diabetes. With natural herbs and supplements, however, there's usually no documented history of their effectiveness. Therefore, before taking any herbal treatment for diabetes, make sure you talk it over with your primary health care physician first.
