After the start? end? of meal

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KayC

KayC

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I have to ask another question...It's been 3 months since the dx, I feel rather silly to ask this: Is 'After meal' after the start of meal or after the end of meal???:confused:

I'm told to check my BG before the meal and 2 hrs after the meal. For the 'after', I've been doing after the end of the meal. But now I'm reading Maggie Davey's open lettet to T2, which was recommended by this site, and she says 'after' is after the start of the meal.

I'm trying to eat slowly so it takes (specially evening meals) about 30mins. I thought I've been controlling my BG, but it means that my readings have been made 2hrs and 30 mins after the meal....the real reading could have been higher....

It might be trivial, but can anybody give me some advice??
 
I do my testing 2 hours after my meal and always have , but as i understand some do there testing diffirently.
 
Steffie said:
I do my testing 2 hours after my meal and always have , but as i understand some do there testing diffirently.
Click to expand...

Do you test 2hrs after the end?
Maybe I'm just being pedantic??🙂
 
Hi Kay, I've also always taken it to mean 2 hours after STARTING the meal, not finishing it. In a non-diabetic person, insulin production begins as soon as you start chewing your food and rises to a peak at the peak of food digestion. Ideally, we are trying to mimic this profile by either injecting insulin (Type 1) or eating food that digests at aa similar rate to your body's ability to produce insulin (Type 2 not on insulin).
 
I also work on the 2 hours from the start of eating principle, unless it's a long meal with first course of low-carb no-chew soup with no bread eg wedding reception meals - always difficult, and I didn't like weddings even before diabetes... But I don't usually test 2 hrs after an unusual meal (about once every 3 years)
 
Thank you guys, much appreciated.
It's good that here I can ask questions I'd rather not in real life!:D
 
KayC

As with so many D things... I think it varies

What is the 2-hour test meant to show you? What are you expecting? Are you aiming for the 'no higher than 8.5mmol/l two hours after eating' guideline?

Some suggest the one hour after eating will show the peak of most meals, but it may not for you. Yours might be an hour and a half. Depending on what you are eating your BG may not even have peaked at two hours!

My suggestion would be to splurge a few test strips on some fairly 'usual' meals in your diet to see when your peak is, then use that as a guide to assess how other meals are affecting you.

M
 
I doubt that it really makes that much of a difference (esp in the case of T2). I also thought it took about 15mins to get to the fingers after eating (unless you took sugar or glucose). On some meters you can set a reminder for 2hrs so in that case it's 2hrs after the start of the meal! (assuming you took a reading before eating).

P.S. I'm impressed that Kayc is presscribed test strips being diet only.
 
Hi KayC,

I'm a non-insulin dependent Type 2 and I have always taken the times as being from finishing eating my meal.

Basically, I consider the most important thing to learn is roughly when your own readings peak after a meal. In my case, that is usually somewhere between 60 and 90 minutes after I finish eating.

To keep well clear of the nasty complications that can come a diabetic's way, in my opinion, the most important thing that a non-insulin dependent Type 2 needs to do is to learn how to control the peaks in their blood glucose levels as near as they can to normal levels - i.e. between 4 and 7 mmol/l.

Good luck and best wishes - John
 
In my case it's 2 hours after taking my insulin, so that could be before or after meal. Saying that I really don't test that often after meals.
 
Thank you all,
After reading all replies, I've done a little experiment. For a while, I checked my BG level both after the start and after the end of meal. It seems that 'after the start' always shows higher reading: so I will keep doing this.🙂
 
Thanks for reporting back - much appreciated.
 
I posted this same question to DUK after i'd been diagnosed and this was their answer:-

The recommendation is to test at least 2 hours after food, as this gives sufficient time for the body to digest the food you have eaten, and will give an accurate guide to how well your body has dealt with the food with regards to insulin production.

hope this helps 🙂
 
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