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Metformin + monitoring

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annc

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Relationship to Diabetes
Type 2
I was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes at the end of July and have been on diet alone. However, I was eating a very healthy diet already, and am unable to take much exercise for health reasons, and there was little change in my levels. Yesterday I started Metformin 500mg daily, to increase to twice daily after a week.

I plan to monitor before and after new meals, but wonder how often, apart from this, pre and post-prandial recordings, or fasting levels should be made, and what levels I should aim for?

I do my DESMOND day in a fortnight.
 
Hi Annc, have you had your first HbA1c yet? If so, would you mind if I ask what it is please? Amanda x 🙂
 
Blood glucose targets are explained here: http://www.diabetes.org.uk/Guide-to-diabetes/Monitoring/Blood_glucose/Blood_glucose_targets/

Type 2 diabetes (NICE 2008)
Before meals (and fasting): 4-7mmol/l
Two hours after meals: less than 8.5mmol/l

As metformin doesn't cause hypoglycaemia (although anyone can become hypoglycaemic), there's no need to test before driving, exercise etc. I realise that you mentioned that exercise is difficult, but I wanted to give a complete answer.

Key thing is to record your levels and show that you are making use of the readings eg to test how your body copes with various foods, in order to prove that you need your prescribed strips.

Hope you find DESMOND useful.
 
7.8 I think - 2 years ago.

I like the title - must look it up on Wikipedia - I keep picturing a chiton, from my A-level days, and I know that isn't the same!
 
Hi annc and welcome aboard. I hope you find the DESMOND day helpful and look forward to getting to know you better. Ask anything you need to know and someone will have the answer. XXXXX
 
Hi Ann

I'm a tad confused here. Your A1c was 7.8 2 years ago, so you were diabetic 2 years ago then????? Did you mean 2 weeks/2 months?

And could you please exactly define 'a healthy diet' - cos what might be excellently healthy for a non-diabetic is not usually/often/always/all that (choose your word!) universally healthy for a diabetic.

We each have our own individual tolerances in this respect and we each need to identify our own problem areas by testing before and after meals and thereafter making sensible food choices. You may find eg that your breakfast is positively the worst time of day for your body to tolerate carbs - or another time of day .....

Plus the fact that the NHS seem to advise nearly all diabetics to eat shedloads of carbohydrate and it's usually the carbs that are the over-riding problem for diabetics (I'd put a conservative estimate of let's say 99% of diabetics LOL) and their blood glucose levels. If I didn't know that from O Level Biology, I certainly know it as a diabetic .....

Also GP nurses don't seem to recognise that an awful lot of fruits and quite a lot of vege's have a great deal of carbohydrate too ....
 
Sorry - 2 months!

I eat mainly fish and white meat, plus quite a lot of fruit and veg. I'm planning to have more pasta, and sometimes have rice or couscous.

Breakfast is porridge with either raisins or blueberries.
 
annc said:
Sorry - 2 months!

I eat mainly fish and white meat, plus quite a lot of fruit and veg. I'm planning to have more pasta, and sometimes have rice or couscous.

Breakfast is porridge with either raisins or blueberries.
Click to expand...

Basmati or brown rice is best, wholewheat pasta, and I'd forget the raisins - blueberries should be OK though 🙂 Raisins are very concentrated little packages of sugar (as are sultanas :()
 
As others have said, many fruit and vegetables do contain lots of carbohydrate. However, it's still important to eat a wide range fruit & veg to get vitamins and minerals. Portion size is often key - a small portion of something you really like may be a better personal choice than a larger portion of something you don't like.

For breakfast cereal toppings, most berries are lowish sugar. We very rarely buy any, but grow raspberries and strawberries and collect blackberries from commons etc to eat fresh in season and freeze blackberries and raspberries for later - mushy berries are OK for cereals.

AnnC, hope you found photos of both copepods and chitons - both great little creatures and more distantly related to each other than, for example, humans and tunicates! Chitons are easier to find in rock pools than many other marine invertebrates.
 
I'd be careful of too many carbs. It's easy for type 1s to compensate with bolus doses of insulin accordingly. However, it's not so easy for type 2s.
As for just starting on Metfartin, I'd be tempted to carefully watch your fruit & Veg intake until you found out if you're prone to the side effects. If they do have an effect you will know about it, believe me I know as I had to go onto the slow release version. Good Luck🙂
 
hi,
As a t2 low carber my experience of bs raising is...BAD:sugar grains pasta rice potatoes bread parsnips swede sprouts carrots tomatoes any fruit except blueberries milk based products esp skimmed....GOOD: mashed cauliflower boiled cauliflower fried in butter cauliflower and broccolli...eggs and bacon...well any meat or fish....nuts...pork scratchings and cheese.

ask to use loads of strips to test what foods make your bs shoot up, everyones different, but carbs usually are the baddies. good luck honey!

Sorry...forgot to answer your question...aim for:
after fasting, good control = below 7.0, tho the magic number for excellent control apparently is 5.0 - 6.0 ( dont hit that one very often myself, im 6.3 - 7.0)
 
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spouts are just evil and should be banned anyway :D
 
That aside Mark LOL - why would they play havoc with anyone's BG? - boiled, per 100g, they are only 3.5g of carb. And cauli is 3g.
 
Welcome to the forum Ann,

I have to say that whilst I'm diet and exercise controlled and have been fortunate to find that losing weight has improved my diabetic symptoms greatly, the foods I really keep an eye on are things like potatoes, pasta and rice.

Unfortunately, they were my favorites before diagnosis and I used to get through platefuls of the stuff! These days I have really modest portion sizes.

Also, beware of any advice from the healthcare guys which recommends "plenty of starchy carbohydrates with each meal"! Fortunately, my experience has been far more sensible but there are some very 'odd' health professionals out there who don't seem to understand diabetes! 😱

Andy 🙂
 
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