Don’t get Dubai’s Dr Graham Simpson started on the use of insulin to treat type 2 diabetes – or the way most doctors in Dubai treat disease in general. Ditto sugar. And same for most diets. Reversing type 2 diabetes is about tackling the primary causes: poor diet and lack of exercise. ”What we should be doing is reversing insulin resistance in the first place,” he says, instead of prescribing insulin.
The South African internal medicine specialist believes there is much money to be made from people who don’t take care of their bodies. And that is why many physicians continue to treat symptoms rather than try to heal, by going after what is often the root cause.
Dr Simpson has taught medicine at the University of Nevada, has practiced in several countries and has authored several books. He is a founding member of the Holistic Medical Association and a licensed homeopath.
“The point is most doctors don’t know how to treat chronic disease,” he says, adding that “the random person meeting the random doctor is going to be made much worse”.
Now, about sugar
Dr Simpson takes a more proactive approach at his base in Dubai, Euromed Clinic, reversing type 2 diabetes in patients starting with their sugar consumption.
The body simply cannot process this man-made compound, he says.
“Even one soda per day is too much,” he says. “Sugar, and obviously high fructose corn syrup, is particularly toxic.” The latter, he says, “doesn’t get metabolized like sugar, it goes straight to the liver.”
His regime has as its core element the requirement that patients follow a ketogenic diet to lose weight. Studies have suggested that a high-fat, low-carb diet like keto – which has been around since the 1920s and was used to regulate seizures – is effective in reducing blood sugar.
Fasting, sleep and a better microbiome
Add to that intermittent fasting, which studies have shown is beneficial in a number of disease-reducing areas including diabetes. He also aims to improve the quality of sleep, reduce stress and heal the microbiome. He prescribes vitamins and minerals including Vitamin D, magnesium and berberine. Berberine is a blood-sugar lowering, plant-derived chemical that can be found in goldenseal and tree turmeric.
The first step in Dr Simpson’s program is to place patients on a continuous sugar monitor to judge the immediate impact of their new diet. Then, Dr Simpson presents them with multi-colored graphs that illustrate the impact of his approach.
“I say, ‘Listen, I want you now to do this, and I will gradually wean you off your meds,’” he says. “You’d be shocked, these sugar levels come down to normal over 24 to 48 hours.”
Then, the long term
Many, although not all, are able to stick to the diet, a process that is made much easier when the carbohydrates that trigger hunger and cravings are out of the picture.
Dr Simpson puts his patients on the regime for three to four months. If they stay on the diet and lose the weight, his success rate at reversing type 2 diabetes symptoms is about 85 percent, he says.
Once they’ve lost the required weight, they can transition to a Paleo diet, which consists of lean meats, fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds.
• An initial consultation with Dr Simpson at Euromed Clinic in Dubai is Dh1,065.
Featured photo: Anna Sullivan/Unsplash
