‘Being married may help people maintain lower blood sugar levels’

According to a study published online in the journal BMJ Open Diabetes Research & Care, people who live with a partner have a higher possibility of being healthy in terms of keeping lower blood sugar levels, regardless of how amicable or combative their relationship is. According to researchers, having a spouse or cohabiting partner may be a significant relationship and source of social support and/or strain for persons in their mid to late-life health. Previous studies have suggested there are health benefits from marriage and/or cohabiting, particularly for older adults. There are also various studies that have concluded that type 2 diabetes risk is associated with a number of social health dimensions including social isolation, loneliness, living arrangements, social support, and social network size. However, the effects of each specific social health dimension are complex, so a team of researchers from Luxembourg and Canada set out to investigate if there was an association between marital status and marital quality with average glycemic levels in older adults.