Participation in a three-month multicomponent lifestyle intervention was associated with greater improvements in dietary habits, physical activity, glycemic control, lipid profile, and anthropometric indicators compared with usual care among adults with type 2 diabetes mellitus in the Peruvian Amazon.
The multicomponent intervention produced significantly greater improvements in dietary habits compared to the control group.
The intervention was associated with significantly greater reductions in fasting blood glucose (FBG) compared to usual care.
The intervention produced significantly greater reductions in glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) compared to the control group.
The intervention was associated with significantly greater reductions in lipid profile markers, specifically triglycerides and total cholesterol.
The intervention produced significantly greater improvements in all three anthropometric indicators assessed: BMI, waist circumference, and waist-to-height ratio.
Physical activity increased to a significantly greater extent among intervention participants compared to controls.
No significant between-group difference was observed for serum creatinine.
The study used a quasi-experimental design with a non-randomized control group and pre-post assessments conducted among adults with type 2 diabetes in the Peruvian Amazon.
This research suggests that a three-month program combining nutrition education, cooking workshops, group exercise classes (including traditional dance and Zumba), home visits, and digital follow-up via WhatsApp and phone calls can significantly improve multiple health outcomes in adults living with type 2 diabetes in the Peruvian Amazon. Compared to people receiving usual care, participants in the program showed meaningful reductions in blood sugar levels (both immediate fasting glucose and the longer-term HbA1c measure), lower cholesterol and triglyceride levels, and reduced body weight, waist size, and waist-to-height ratio. They also reported substantially more physical activity and better dietary habits. The only measure that did not show a significant difference between groups was serum creatinine, a marker of kidney function. The scale of some of these changes is notable — for example, fasting blood glucose dropped by an average of about 84 mg/dL more in the intervention group than in the control group, and HbA1c fell by about 2.3 percentage points more. Physical activity increased by over 3,000 MET-minutes per week more in the intervention group, which is roughly equivalent to several additional hours of moderate exercise per week. These results suggest that combining educational, behavioral, and social support strategies — including culturally familiar activities like traditional dance — may be particularly effective in community health settings. This research is notable because it was conducted in a real-world hospital setting in the Peruvian Amazon, a region and population that is underrepresented in diabetes research. However, because participants were not randomly assigned to groups, it is harder to rule out other factors that might explain the differences. Still, the findings suggest that multicomponent, culturally adapted lifestyle programs could be a practical and effective tool for improving diabetes management in similar low-resource or underserved settings.
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Upload Your LabsChia Sánchez M, Iman Torres A, Guerra Sangama W, Li Loo Kung C, Dávila Panduro S, Huaman Gutierrez O, et al.. (2026). Effects of a Multicomponent Lifestyle Intervention on Behavioral and Cardiometabolic Outcomes in Adults with Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus in the Peruvian Amazon.. Nutrients. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu18162699