• Please Remember: Members are only permitted to share their own experiences. Members are not qualified to give medical advice. Additionally, everyone manages their health differently. Please be respectful of other people's opinions about their own diabetes management.
  • We seem to be having technical difficulties with new user accounts. If you are trying to register please check your Spam or Junk folder for your confirmation email. If you still haven't received a confirmation email, please reach out to our support inbox: support.forum@diabetes.org.uk

Blood test results

Status
This thread is now closed. Please contact Anna DUK, Ieva DUK or everydayupsanddowns if you would like it re-opened.
C

Carnival Queen

New Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Carer/Partner
Hello. I am a new member, just joined a couple of minutes ago. This morning my husband received blood test results and was told his blood sugar is 52. I thought it should be in the region of 5.2, can anyone enlighten me please? He said he wants to try and control it by diet but I think we need to understand the level he is at before we can do that. Any advice welcome. Thank you.
 
52 will be HBA1C which is a measurement of how much glucose has attached to red blood cells over a period on average of 3 months. 3 months is the average lifespan on a red blood cell.
 
grovesy said:
52 will be HBA1C which is a measurement of how much glucose has attached to red blood cells over a period on average of 3 months. 3 months is the average lifespan on a red blood cell.
Click to expand...
Thank you. Is that a very high reading? Would you be happy to try and resolve it with diet alone?
 
No it is not a very high reading but definitely Diabetic.
I suggest you search the link at the orange bar labelled Learning Zone at the top of the page.
 
The HbA1c threshold for a diabetes diagnosis is 48, so hubby is just a bit above that. Certainly changing diet and other lifestyle measures should be the main strategy, but there's no harm in helping things along with Metformin, the usual first-line Type 2 diabetes med, if yr doc prescribes it. A few days of gastro problems are pretty common for people starting on it, but usually things settle down.
 
Thank you so much. I agree that metformin would help but he is adamant he can deal with it by diet. The doctor has agreed to review in 2 months so let's hope he's back to a better reading by then. Lockdown diet hasn't helped! So grateful for your advice.
 
grovesy said:
No it is not a very high reading but definitely Diabetic.
I suggest you search the link at the orange bar labelled Learning Zone at the top of the page.
Click to expand...
Thank you. I will do as you suggest. Grateful for your advice.
 
Carnival Queen said:
Thank you so much. I agree that metformin would help but he is adamant he can deal with it by diet. The doctor has agreed to review in 2 months so let's hope he's back to a better reading by then. Lockdown diet hasn't helped! So grateful for your advice.
Click to expand...

I found this pic useful when starting out on the D journey:

1599051421172.png

Top blue numbers are HbA1c. You can see 52 is in the not-very-scary greeny-yellowy part - unlike me and others around here who were up in the pretty-darn-scary orangey-red area on diagnosis.

The bottom numbers are fingeprick blood glucose levels - snapshots as against the long-term average reflected in the HbA1c. This is probably what you were thinking of with 5.2. The correspondence between the two measures shown in the pic is very approximate and hazy, but if you were taking lots of fingerprick measurements during the day and they were averaging less than 7- or 8-ish, your HbA1c would probably be in the green area.
 
Hi @Carnival Queen and welcome to the forum.

As others have suggested, because your husband is just above the diabetes threshold, chances are he can get back on track by adjusting his diet. Have you picked up that in this context by diet, we mean what you eat and not how much. Basically, it's the carbohydrates in the diet that end up as glucose in the blood and having diabetes means that the body is struggling for some reason to process it. Reducing the carbohydrate intake reduces the amount of glucose the body has to deal with and brings the blood glucose down.

Read around the forum and check out the learning zone and come back with questions - nothing is too silly, we have all been there. There is always somebody around to answer them.
 
Docb said:
Hi @Carnival Queen and welcome to the forum.

As others have suggested, because your husband is just above the diabetes threshold, chances are he can get back on track by adjusting his diet. Have you picked up that in this context by diet, we mean what you eat and not how much. Basically, it's the carbohydrates in the diet that end up as glucose in the blood and having diabetes means that the body is struggling for some reason to process it. Reducing the carbohydrate intake reduces the amount of glucose the body has to deal with and brings the blood glucose down.

Read around the forum and check out the learning zone and come back with questions - nothing is too silly, we have all been there. There is always somebody around to answer them.
Click to expand...
Hello and thank you for your warm welcome.
Regarding what you eat and not how much, yes, I do get it! I have bought the Carb and Calorie Counter book which looks very helpful but alas doesn't give any direction as to the amount of carb intake we should aim for. I understand this varies with age/weight/gender/physical activity but I would have hoped for a rough guide. My husband is 72, overweight but not drastically so, retired but pretty active (2 rounds of golf a week on a hilly course) and generally a busy person both mentally and physically.
Are you able to give any guidance carb intake? I will have a look around the forum for info too. This is only my first day of membership but I have already found it so helpful and I have to say, rather reassuring.
Thank you again.
 
There are no real fixed numbers, it varies from person to person. One place to start is over the next few days to note down everything he consumes and then use your carbs and cals book and packaging labels to get an estimate for the amount of carbs in his current diet. Everything means everything,, meals, snacks and drinks. Might have to weigh some things but there is no need to try to be perfect, a good idea will be good enough. Total it up, divide by the number of days and you will have a good idea of current intake. Expect that to be somewhere between 200 and 300 grams per day, give or take. When you have that then think about halving it. One way of doing that is to look at your notes and go for the "low hanging fruit", that is carby things you can eliminate or substitute with something else. The recipes and food section will give you ideas.

In terms of targets, I am in the same age/fitness bracket as your husband and aim for about 100g per day spread out over three meals. You will find most of us on carb control will be around that value, give or take. Some go much lower, you just have to find what suits you.

Reducing carbs does tend to give a slow and steady weight loss which can be a benefit if weight loss is needed but if not, then increasing the fat levels in the diet can be used to compensate for the calorie reduction from reducing carb intake. You will see in your reading LCHF mentioned. This is a Low Carb High Fat way of eating which is the way many of us have gone. You might just have to unlearn some of the messages constantly being thrown at us about fat being unhealthy.

Keep asking the questions!
 
My top tip is to reject the low fat versions of all products. You might think that this will result in weight gain. It tends not to do so. Fat fills and you find that you eat less and lose weight. It also makes things taste good. No need to wear a hair shirt and go on a fast. If that's not enough fats also provide the fat soluble vitamins.
 
... and my top tip is to get hold of a blood glucose meter and embark on a sensible testing regime, in order to discover how much of which foods your husband's body can handle without sending his blood glucose into the stratosphere. Here's a jolly good plan for doing that very thing

Test, Review, Adjust

Managing blood glucose levels for type 2 diabetes. Learning how to achieve long term control by testing and diet.
loraldiabetes.blogspot.com loraldiabetes.blogspot.com
 
I second @trophywench’s suggestion. You’d be amazed how different our individual tolerance levels are - for example I couldn’t even tolerate the carbs in the diet shakes, and can only ‘do’ 100g on insulin. Others will find they can easily manage 100g or more without medication. You can’t know what your body’s limits are without testing.
 
LOL - I rarely eat 100g worth in a normal day though I well might today cos I had a weird longish hypo this morning after the late high last night due to a fatty dinner that I grossly unerestimated the carbs and therefore the insulin for. It's hardly ever an exact science but usually I get it more right than wrong - you'd think I'd be perfect after 48 years doing it - but I ain't and that's the truth.
 
Welcome to the forum @Carnival Queen

Glad you have found your first foray into the forum helpful.

We are always here for you as you embark on this new chapter of life and come across those inevitable ‘What does this mean...’ ‘What do we do about...’ ‘Is this normal...’ questions and conundrums that will arise over the coming months.

Sounds like you are off to a good start - hopefully with a modest me u tweak and your husband’s level of activity, your next HbA1c will show positive effects of your efforts.
 
trophywench said:
LOL - I rarely eat 100g worth in a normal day though I well might today cos I had a weird longish hypo this morning after the late high last night due to a fatty dinner that I grossly unerestimated the carbs and therefore the insulin for. It's hardly ever an exact science but usually I get it more right than wrong - you'd think I'd be perfect after 48 years doing it - but I ain't and that's the truth.
Click to expand...
I ain't too! And 48 years uf my doing it too.

But if you underestimated the carbs and gave too little insulin you would have gone hyper. Did you over correct?
 
Thanks to everyone for the helpful tips and information. We will use them all. Is there a 'go to' book that anyone can recommend to provide help on counting carbs? I would like something simple and straightforward to help me when shopping and deciding on meals - not a cookery book, more just lists of amounts of carbs contained in different foods.
 
Yes @leonS I over corrected and consequently taking practically all day to sort it. Been a VERY long time since I had hypos lower than 3.0 and obviously this had to happen the day after I've been prescribed the Libre - just Sod's Law! :D
 
Status
This thread is now closed. Please contact Anna DUK, Ieva DUK or everydayupsanddowns if you would like it re-opened.
Back
Top