BALTIMORE -- Soaring blood sugar, diabetes and high cholesterol are all words most people don't want to hear, but what if you could manage them simply by eating a common spice?

Video: Does Cinnamon Fight Diabetes

Barry Ballow told Baltimore television station WBAL that he is currently full of energy, but it hasn't always been that way. He said he struggled with his blood sugar for years, and then his doctor told him he was a diabetic.

Ballow said he took medication and changed his diet and exercise routine, but said it wasn't until he found the product Cinnergen that things really turned around.

"I became aware of Cinnergen, and I was happy to try that because there are no side effects. And it's gotten me down to the normal range," Ballow said.

Cinnergen is a liquid whole food nutritional supplement. The manufacturer said it is filled with antioxidants, amino acids, vitamins, minerals -- and cinnamon.

Dr. Richard Goldfarb is from the Bucks County Clinical Research Center in Pennsylvania. He said his lab was paid to test Cinnergen and that he has a financial interest in the company that owns the product.

Goldfarb said clinical studies showed that cinnamon makes insulin work more efficiently.

"Cinnamon makes the insulin receptors very receptive to the circulating sugar that we take in our body," he said.

Goldfarb said his studies show patients who drink the product have better insulin levels.

"We actually saw that their levels had dropped, and I believe it was 52 percent of the patients in the study could actually come off of their prescription meds by just taking Cinnergen," he said.

Ballow is one of those patients. He's said he's currently doing testimonials for Cinnergen.

A 2003 Pakistan study found that a gram of ground cinnamon a day seemed to help lower blood sugar. According to one of the researchers, people can get that with a quarter- to a half-teaspoon of store-bought cinnamon twice a day or in cinnamon capsules that are sold over the counter. Another option is ground or stick cinnamon in hot water.

"There was nothing negative that I was concerned about," said Dr. Rebecca Denison, a diabetes expert at the Greater Baltimore Medical Center, who looked into the product.

Denison said she likes the ingredients of Cinnergen, but warned it's not a quick fix.

"I just don't want people to think they can do only that and not adjust their lifestyle, their food and their activity level," she said.

Cinnergen or cinnamon products may not help people with the more advanced Type 1 diabetes, health experts said. Ballow has Type 2.

The Cinnergen study was small, but it also showed that cinnamon might help lower triglycerides and LDL, or bad cholesterol, even in healthy people. Check with your doctor first before trying it.

Researchers said to get the correct effect, you have to get just the right amount of cinnamon. One researcher said that too much won't have any effect.

If you would like more information about the study, click here.