Diabetes and rheumatoid arthritis

[rebrascora]

Losing a lot of weight without trying and your high HbA1c suggests you might be Type 1 rather than Type 2. It is unlikely to help with treatment as insulin will be required but having Type 1 testing (Gad antibody and C-peptide tests) would prevent further time wasted messing around with medication like Metformin which would not be beneficial.
Increasing your fat intake would help to stabilise your weight if you are losing too much whilst still cutting carbohydrate portion size. I would recommend you try a cooked breakfast with eggs and/or meat and see if you get an improvement in your readings.

 

[Owl123]

Losing a lot of weight without trying and your high HbA1c suggests you might be Type 1 rather than Type 2. It is unlikely to help with treatment as insulin will be required but having Type 1 testing (Gad antibody and C-peptide tests) would prevent further time wasted messing around with medication like Metformin which would not be beneficial.
Increasing your fat intake would help to stabilise your weight if you are losing too much whilst still cutting carbohydrate portion size. I would recommend you try a cooked breakfast with eggs and/or meat and see if you get an improvement in your readings.

Thanks for the reply, will speak to consultant about this and see what they say. As for breakfast will also give it a try in near future.
Cheers
Tom

 

[Pumper_Sue]

Have you tried porcine insulin?

 

[silentsquirrel]

Many GPs and nurses assume people over a certain age are T2 without testing for T1 - hopefully a diabetes consultant would know better! The recent diagnosis of the Speaker as T1, and earlier of Theresa May should be making a difference to awareness that T1 can occur at any age.
I agree with @rebrascora that the loss of so much weight without trying, and the high HbA1c, could well suggest you are T1, probably slow-onset.

 

[Owl123]

Have you tried porcine insulin?

Not yet but I have a list and will be crossing them off until I find one that works either fully or one that does not cause too much problem, a compromise if needed.

 

[trophywench]

Whole thing is potty Owl - too high BG for too long will cause you FAR more problems - eg all your organs closing down!

If you have inflammation anywhere which you certainly do have with RA - that causes the BG to absolutely soar. Hence you have a perfect vicious circle. As Sue suggested - animal insulins tend to be a lot 'kinder' to the body generally which is just as well for us old uns since there WERE only animal insulins when we were diagnosed but one certainly couldn't have a very flexible lifestyle with them. So you know when you talk about your consultant - is that for arthritis or diabetes? cos the one most certainly won't know too much about the other condition.

 

[Owl123]

Whole thing is potty Owl - too high BG for too long will cause you FAR more problems - eg all your organs closing down!

If you have inflammation anywhere which you certainly do have with RA - that causes the BG to absolutely soar. Hence you have a perfect vicious circle. As Sue suggested - animal insulins tend to be a lot 'kinder' to the body generally which is just as well for us old uns since there WERE only animal insulins when we were diagnosed but one certainly couldn't have a very flexible lifestyle with them. So you know when you talk about your consultant - is that for arthritis or diabetes? cos the one most certainly won't know too much about the other condition.

I have been talking to both, and totally agree, neither know a lot about the others subject. I am trying to find a good balance between both the illnesses. so i can have a decent quality of life.