Research

Energy balance

Improvement in glycemic control in T2D patients leads to energy conservation via reduced glucosuria and osmotic water weight loss, which mechanically impedes scale-based weight reduction.

When you start treating your diabetes effectively, your blood sugar drops. This means your body stops peeing out calories (glucosuria) and starts storing water and glycogen again. You might see the scale go up by a few pounds. This is not fat gain; it is your body recovering from dehydration and energy loss. Do not stop your diabetes treatment because of this scale increase.

ModerateQualifiesHIGH confidence
When weight reduction improves glucose control in patients with diabetes mellitus, then energy is conserved due to reduced glucosuria... anti-obesity interventions that improve glucose metabolism will not only conserve energy by reducing glucosuria, but also reverse the osmotic dehydration, replenish muscle glycogen, and increase its associated water, which all contribute to weight gain.
Harold Bays · Obesity Pillars · 2023

Why this rating

Mechanistic explanation provided in a review paper; relies on established physiological principles cited in references.

Source

Why does type 2 diabetes mellitus impair weight reduction in patients with obesity? A review

Harold Bays · Obesity Pillars · 2023

DOI 10.1016/j.obpill.2023.100076

narrative_reviewCited 34×
Read the paper
DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10

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