Generic Amaryl (Glimepiride) Information

The answer to how bad junk food is for you depends on how much of it you eat.

According to the experts we consulted in making What’s Really In Our Food?, having a burger or pizza now and again as part of a properly balanced diet that includes plenty of vitamins and nutrients is not going to damage your health.

Instead, most of the experts agreed that the real problem lies with what they call “junk diets”. This is when people eat junk food to the exclusion of everything else.

Having a sugary breakfast, a burger for lunch and a pizza for dinner every day – and no fruit and vegetables – is the kind of diet that over the long term can lead to serious health problems including Type II diabetes, heart attack and stroke.

Almost one in five children under-15 are currently obese, and if current trends continue, more than half of the adult population could be clinically obese by 2050.

To help us make more informed decisions about what we eat dieticians sometimes refer to what are called “Guideline Daily Amounts” or GDAs for short.

These are daily targets to aim at in order that we do not eat the quantities of food that can lead to health problems.

Guideline daily amounts for men, women and children

Using this scale it is possible to assess how some types of fast foods can contribute a huge number of calories, salt, fat or sugar in a single portion.

For example, a Burger King double whopper with cheese contains 923 calories. That is almost half what a woman should eat in an entire day.

A muffin from a high street coffee chain can contain 500 calories. This is a fifth of a man’s guideline daily amount in one snack.

Equally a single slice of Domino’s double decadence cheese and tomato pizza can contain 1.9g of salt, or about a third of the guideline daily amount for both men and women.

With this in mind, the recommendations of the experts we talked to was that we should view junk food as a treat and not a staple.

We should be careful about not eating it too much or too often and try to eat small portions.

And we should also try to eat lots of fruit and vegetables. This is something many fast food companies have already taken on board and are trying to offer a greater range of products.

So if you love junk food – do not worry – you do not have to give it up.

What’s Really In Our Food? was broadcast from Monday 26 to Friday 30 November 2007 at 0915 GMT on BBC One.

from Diabetes Care Results A total of 83 patients were randomized to the two treatment arms. Of those, 2 patients were excluded from the ITT analysis for HbA1c (acarbose n = 38, placebo n = 43) and 1 patient had no baseline fasting blood glucose data and was thus excluded from the ITT analysis for FBG (acarbose n = 39, placebo n = 43). In the PP population, 71 patients were included for HbA1c analysis (acarbose n = 33, placebo n = 38) and 74 for FBG analysis (acarbose n = 35, placebo n = 39). All randomized patients were included in the safety analysis (acarbose n = 40, placebo n = 43). Baseline demographic data and efficacy variables of all randomized subjects compared well between the treatment groups (Table 1). Both treatment groups received the same median dosage of metformin (1,700 mg/day). Figure 1A shows the change in mean HbA1c levels during the study course (ITT analysis). Significant differences between the treatment groups compared to baseline were seen for weeks 12 and 24 (P = 0.0009 and P = 0.0023, respectively). Mean HbA1c levels increased in the placebo group from 7.82 ± 0.83% at baseline to 8.1 ± 1.06% at week 12 and 8.5 ± 1.44% at study end. The mean increase after 24 weeks was 0.68 ± 1.17%, with a significant overall time effect (P = 0.0001). In the acarbose group, levels decreased from 8.02 ± 0.85% at baseline to 7.78 ± 1.0% at week 12 (P = 0.0261). Levels then increased to 7.97 ± 1.1% at study end (mean change after 24 weeks was -0.05 ± 0.8%). There was no significant overall time effect for acarbose. The adjusted least square means for the change in HbA1c from baseline to week 24 showed a reduction of 0.16 ± 0.18% in the acarbose arm compared to an increase of 0.86 ± 0.16% in the placebo group, with a statistically significant difference between the treatment arms of 1.02% (95% CI 0.543-1.497, P = 0.0001). There was a significantly greater proportion of responders in the acarbose group (n = 18; 47%) than in the placebo group (n = 6; 14%) (P = 0.001) at the end of the study. Figure 1. (click image to zoom) Change in mean HbA1c (A) and mean FBG (B) during a 24-week treatment period with acarbose (•) or placebo () adjunctive therapy in the ITT population. Mean levels of the secondary efficacy variable FBG increased in the placebo arm from baseline (9.41 ± 1.99 mmol/l) to week 4 (10.06 ± 2.43 mmol/l) and continued to increase to the end of study (10.77 ± 3.39 mmol/l), whereas levels in the acarbose arm varied only slightly from baseline (Fig. 1B). The mean increase was 1.36 ± 2.88 mmol/l for the placebo and 0.08 ± 1.98 mmol/l for the acarbose group. The adjusted least square means showed an increase at end point in both groups: 0.34 ± 0.42 mmol/l for acarbose compared to 1.48 ± 0.39 mmol/l for placebo patients, with a statistically significant difference of 1.132 mmol/l between the two groups (95% CI 0.056-2.208, P = 0.0395). PP analyses for both variables showed similar results, but were not statistically significant for treatment differences concerning FBG. Of the 83 patients valid for safety analysis, 76 completed the study. Mean study duration was 169 days for both acarbose (29-184 days) and placebo (39-176 days). Overall compliance (80-120% compliance) was 100% for acarbose and 95.3% for placebo patients. In all, five patients reduced the medication dose to 50 mg b.i.d. because of adverse events (acarbose, n = 3; placebo, n = 2); three of these patients later reverted back to the original dosage. Patients in both treatment groups experienced a small mean weight reduction over the study period (1.32 ± 2.37 kg for acarbose vs. 0.43 ± 2.9 kg for placebo patients), which was not significantly different (P = 0.13). There were also no significant changes in vital signs. Changes in routine laboratory parameters were similar in both treatment groups, except for one patient (acarbose group) with elevated liver function enzymes who was withdrawn from the study. In total, seven patients were prematurely withdrawn from the study during the 24-week treatment period: four because of treatment-emergent adverse events, one patient on placebo because of constipation and depression, and three patients on acarbose with flatulence, flatulence accompanied by abdominal pain, and the aforementioned elevated liver enzymes. A serious adverse event with remote or no relation to the study medication was experienced by two acarbose patients and one placebo patient; no fatalities occurred. Treatment-emergent adverse events with a relation to the study medication rated as “possible” or “probable” were reported by 75% of acarbose and 55.8% of placebo patients. The main difference between the treatment groups was the higher frequency of gastrointestinal complaints in the acarbose group (Table 2).

from Drug Benefit Trends

What’s Ahead

While the ADA and other organizations fight — unsuccessfully, for now — for additional federal funding for research, studies of ways to stop or slow the devastating effects of diabetes continue. The AAHP and the ADA have joined forces in a national effort, “Taking on Diabetes.” The goal is to promote successful diabetes care by advancing effective clinical practices, developing worksite health programs and community partnerships, and providing annual education programs. As of May, 335 health plans had pledged to participate. Diabetes programs are slowly shifting from targeting only the sickest patients — or those having the most difficulty managing the disease — to more comprehensive efforts that provide additional care and support to every patient with diabetes within a particular health plan, employer group, or community.