The Study
HbA1c and Liver Fat After 16 Weeks of Fasted versus Fed Exercise Training in Adults With Type 2 Diabetes
This study tried to see if walking before breakfast helps diabetics more than walking after breakfast. It found a tiny hint that it might help, but the evidence isn't strong because not many people were in the study and some people changed their medicine halfway through. So we can't say for sure it works — it just looks like it might.
Analysis score
Maximum 90 for a randomized controlled trial.
Where the score came from
This study tested if walking before eating breakfast helps people with type 2 diabetes better than walking after breakfast.
Where does this study sit?
Reviews of RCTs (Meta-analyses)
Max 100Randomized Trials
Max 90Reviews of Cohort Studies
Max 85Cohort Studies
Max 72Reviews of Case-Control Studies
Max 63Case-Control Studies
Max 58Cross-Sectional & Case Series
Max 50Expert Opinion
Max 572 / 100
Quality score
Participants are randomly assigned to treatment or control groups, minimizing bias. The gold standard for testing whether an intervention causes an effect.
Key takeaways
Summary
Based on the study abstract and findings.
- 1The HbA1c drop is small but meaningful — it’s similar to the effect of some diabetes medications.
- 2Losing belly and muscle fat is good, but losing muscle is a concern.
- 3After 16 weeks, people who walked before breakfast had a 0.3% drop in HbA1c (a blood sugar marker), lost 58 mL of belly fat, and lost 1 mL of fat inside muscles — but lost 35 mL of muscle.
- 4Those who walked after breakfast saw no HbA1c change, gained 34 mL of belly fat, gained 0.6 mL of muscle fat, and gained 1.6 mL of muscle.
Score breakdown, methodology, conflicts of interest, evidence analysis & raw study data
Publication
Journal
Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise
Year
2024
Authors
Jordan L. Rees, D. Walesiak, Richard Thompson, Diana R. Mager, Peter Senior, Normand Boule
Related Content
Claims (5)
When people walk in a fasted state versus a fed state but consume the same calories and burn the same amount of energy, the amount of fat lost is the same.
In adults with type 2 diabetes, doing aerobic exercise in the morning before eating reduces visceral fat by 58.3 mL over 16 weeks, while doing the same exercise after eating increases visceral fat by 34.2 mL.
In adults with type 2 diabetes, performing aerobic exercise in the morning before eating reduces intramuscular fat by 1.0 milliliters over 16 weeks, while performing the same exercise after eating increases intramuscular fat by 0.6 milliliters.
In adults with type 2 diabetes, performing aerobic exercise in a fasted state in the morning for 180 minutes per week over 16 weeks results in a 0.3% greater reduction in HbA1c compared to performing the same exercise after meals, where no change in HbA1c was observed, excluding those who changed their glucose-lowering medications.
In adults with type 2 diabetes, doing morning aerobic exercise either before or after eating for 16 weeks does not lead to a measurable decrease in liver fat.
Not medical advice. For informational purposes only. Always consult a qualified healthcare professional before making health decisions.