Effects of guar-pasta on serum lipid levels in obese diabetic and non-diabetic women with normal lipids.

Alternative medications for hyperlipidemia management have been continuously searched for above all because currently employed drugs appear not to be effective or are poorly tolerated. Fibers, such as guar-gum, seem to be able to reduce cholesterol levels, but their extensive and long-term use is beset by the high incidence of gastrointestinal side-effects. In this study the administration of guar-enriched pasta has proved to reduce fasting and post-prandial cholesterol levels significantly in 15 obese normocholesterolemic women (5 diabetics and 10 non-diabetics). The women reported good palatableness of guar-pasta without any side-effects.

The clinical usefulness of glycated hemoglobin in monitoring diabetes mellitus: a long-term study.

To assess the long-term clinical usefulness of measuring glycated hemoglobin (Hb A1), we carried out a two-year longitudinal study involving 234 diabetic patients (116 males, 118 females; 139 with type I diabetes mellitus, 95 with type II). Hb A1 values correlated significantly (p less than 0.001) with a score index based on plasma glucose in a specimen collected after overnight fasting, and urinary glucose, and ketones in a 24-h specimen. However, we found that one of every three well-controlled patients (both type I and II subjects) had high values for Hb A1. Among poorly controlled patients, only those with "brittle" diabetes had good values for Hb A1.

Prevalence and type of sexual dysfunctions in diabetic males: a standardized clinical approach.

The diagnosis of sexual dysfunctions (SD) in diabetic male patients is usually based on interviews about the sexual behavior of the patients themselves. The absence of a standardized procedure may explain the discrepancies in the prevalence reported in previous papers. In this work, we show a rational procedure to assess the presence and the type of SD in a group of 128 diabetic men. By means of an appropriate questionnaire, SD were pointed out in 40% of insulin-dependent diabetics (IDD) and 52% of non-insulin-dependent diabetic patients (NIDD). Among the patients with SD, 28% had organic impotence, 11% psychogenic impotence and 8% reduction of libido. IDD with SD were older (p less than 0.01) and with a longer duration of diabetes (p less than 0.02) than IDD without SD. NIDD with and without SD had similar ages and known duration of diabetes. Both in IDD and in NIDD, the prevalence of SD was not affected by the quality of short-term metabolic control. In the patients in whom it was studied by a different technique, the predominant cause of organic impotence (76%) was a damage of parasympathetic nervous system, as evaluated by non-invasive tests. In 12% of the cases with organic impotence, a reduced penile flow alone was observed, while hormonal parameters were similar in patients with and without organic impotence.