The Diabetes Prevention Program May be Helpful in Treating Non-alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease
An investigation to see if lifestyle
modifications may stave off type 2 diabetes
was spearheaded by the National Institute of
Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases
(NIDDK). The Diabetes
Prevention Program (DPP) was the name of
the study. The DPP study enabled participants
with prediabetes to reduce their risk of type
2 diabetes by 58% compared to usual care. And
the outcomes were achieved with only a little
amount of weight reduction, good diet, and
regular exercise. The study is viewed as a
landmark study because of the outstanding
results. And researchers in a recent
study employed a modified version of the
DPP to treat non‐alcoholic fatty liver disease
(NAFLD).
Fat deposits in the liver are a symptom of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). NAFLD includes nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) and non-alcoholic fatty liver (NAFL). If a person has NASH, the person also has liver fat and liver damage in addition to inflammation.
The NIDDK
initiated the Diabetes Prevention Program
(DPP) study in 1996 to see if weight reduction
encouraged by good diet and exercise might be
used to prevent type 2 diabetes in people with
prediabetes. Three groups were included in the
investigation, which was a randomized
experiment. One group was treated for
prediabetes with diet, exercise, and lifestyle
changes; another utilized metformin as the
treatment; and a third group received a
placebo (representing usual care).
During
the approximately 2.8-year period of the
study, it was concluded that the intensive
lifestyle group experienced a 58% reduction in
the incidence of type 2 diabetes, and that the
metformin group experienced a 31% reduction
compared to the placebo group.
Based on positive results from the original
DPP study, the CDC created the National
Diabetes Prevention Program (National DPP).
And a modified version of the National DPP,
with some focus on NAFLD, was used in the study
to treat the disease.
