Disclaimer: Content is for reference only. Seek immediate medical attention if feeling unwell.

After being diagnosed with diabetes, many patients hope to find a drug, method, or device that can cure diabetes, reduce medication intake, maintain good blood sugar levels, and prevent complications. In pursuit of this, they continuously try various approaches, often going through quite a winding journey. Some patients have been deceived multiple times, and when they come to my clinic, they often pour out their experiences of being scammed to me for quite a while. As Dr. Wu, I genuinely feel quite helpless about this situation.

So I have repeatedly warned diabetic patients on many occasions that they must learn some relevant medical knowledge and pay attention to distinguishing whether medications and treatment methods are scientific and safe. Here, I'd like to provide some identification methods for our fellow diabetics, collectively referred to as unproven therapies—those treatment approaches that haven't undergone rigorous scientific testing and verification. These are some observations I've summarized over more than a decade of practice based on patient feedback, hoping to help diabetics distinguish between genuine and false treatments.

1. Developed by individuals or groups without solid clinical and research credibility outside recognized scientific institutions or organizations, such as certain so-called "science associations" whose names may not even be searchable online.

2. Some institutions selectively extract attractive data and terminology from published scientific papers and discoveries to serve as evidence for their therapies, making their products appear more convincing.

3. They may use exaggerated or inflated terms to describe efficacy, such as: "cure" or "conquer diabetes," "comprehensive improvement," "100% natural," "completely free of side effects," "no dietary restrictions required," and so on.

4. These promoters often avoid engagement with genuine hospital specialists, and such treatments are typically unavailable in legitimate hospitals or medical institutions.

5. Typically promotes efficacy based on individual patient cases, lacking substantial clinical data

6. Using celebrity biographies and news reports as promotional vehicles in the media, their advertisements often feature contact numbers and detailed addresses of the promoted individuals. They also lure diabetes patients with unverified or even fictitious international awards and dizzying honorific titles.

7. Organizing various diabetes 义诊 (free medical consultation) events, primarily to sell their medications

8. Some individuals, not even medically trained themselves, leverage traditional Chinese medicine and herbal treatments to promote certain drugs or products, claiming to be the inventors, portraying themselves as the disciples of some grandmaster for several generations, or coming from a lineage of traditional Chinese medicine practitioners spanning many generations, or claiming to have devoted years of independent research, and so on.

In short, these are all kinds of fancy gimmicks aimed at making money from people with diabetes, not truly treating the disease. When encountering such claims in the future, people with diabetes should not be fooled again. They must seek treatment at proper hospitals. Currently, clinical glucose-lowering medications are all very effective, just applied differently depending on the patient's condition.

Additionally, Dr. Wu still maintains his stance—there are no shortcuts in managing blood sugar. Don’t waste time on baseless products. It’s better to diligently manage your diet, exercise, and learn some diabetes management knowledge.