Fasts, feasts and festivals in diabetes-1: Glycemic management during Hindu fasts.
This communication is the first of a series on South Asian fasts, festivals, and diabetes, designed to spread awareness and stimulate research on this aspect of diabetes and metabolic care. It describes the various fasts observed as part of Hindu religion and offers a classification scheme for them, labeling them as infrequent and frequent. The infrequent fasts are further sub-classified as brief and prolonged, to facilitate a scientific approach to glycemic management during these fasts. Pre-fast counseling, non-pharmacological therapy, pharmacological modification, and post-fast debriefing are discussed in detail. All available drug classes and molecules are covered in this article, which provides guidance about necessary changes in dosage and timing of administration. While in no way exhaustive, the brief review offers a basic framework which diabetes care professionals can use to counsel and manage persons in their care who wish to observe various Hindu fasts.
Department of Endocrinology, Bharti Hospital and Bride, Karnal, Haryana, India.
Sanjay
S
Kalra
Department of Medicine, MLN Medical College, Allahabad, India.
Sarita
S
Bajaj
Department of Medicine, Governemnt Medical College, Chandigarh, India.
Yashdeep
Y
Gupta
Department of Endocrinology, Hormone Care and Research Centre, Ghaziabad, India.
Pankaj
P
Agarwal
Department of Endocrinology, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, India.
S K
SK
Singh
Department of Endocrinology, Synergy Hospital, Indore, Madhya Pradesh, India.
Sandeep
S
Julka
Department of Medicine, North Delhi Diabetes Centre, New Delhi, India.
Rajeev
R
Chawla
Department of Medicine, Diabetes, Obesity and Thyroid Clinic, Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh, India.
Navneet
N
Agrawal
Culture bound medicine; Hinduism; India; diabetes mellitus; insulin; oral hypoglycemic agents