Has Been Underweight, Diagnosed Diabetes. Controlled Sugar With Diet And Exercise. Has BMI Of 16. Suggest?

Posted on Sat, 19 Oct 2013

Question: My father is 69 years old. He has been underweight at different times of his life. After being detected with borderline diabetes, he took drastic measures to take care of his health and controlled the sugar through a lot of walking and diet control. His weight is at the moment 55 kg and height is 6 ft (BMI around 16). Is this dangerous? Can you suggest some additions we can make to his diet which will help him put on weight without increasing sugar?
Thanks,

Answered by Dr. Dr. Basheer Ahamed (2 hours later)

Brief Answer:
Weight is ideal for his height.

Detailed Answer:
Hello,

Welcome to XXXXXXX Thanks for your query.

I think your father's body weight is ideal.
There are two types of Type II diabetes patients. One is obese(Most common) and the other are lean like your father.

It is little difficult to manage lean diabetes because of high insulin resistance.
In your father's case the diabetes after such long age is mainly due to B cell depletion of the pancreas which secrete insulin.

So the line of management is exercise and diet to decrease the insulin resistance and medication(OHA/insulin) to replace insulin deficiency and control blood sugar.

In my opinion your father's weight is ideal so no need to add extra weight. On the other hand increase in body weight will pose challenge in the control of blood sugar and lead to diabetes related complications more earlier.

If insulin is used in the therapy then it may increase this body weight but way of water retention in the body.

Regarding this diet. It should be aimed that providing nutrition and energy but not
to put weight in your father's case.

All diabetes need a personalised diet plan which is suitable and easily adoptable.
For this your may take the help of a dietician.

Hope the answer helps you.
Pleased to answer other queries.

Note: For further follow-up, discuss your blood glucose reports with our diabetologist. Click here.

Above answer was peer-reviewed by : Dr. Chakravarthy Mazumdar