Diabetics should be prepared for low blood sugar events

[Northerner]

A surprisingly good article! Only thing I would dispute is that a moderate hypo (2-3 mmol/l) would need assistance. 🙂

Low blood sugar (better known as hypoglycemia) is a down side of having insulin-requiring diabetes. The average person with diabetes, taking insulin or a blood sugar lowering medication, can expect an average of 5,000 episodes of low blood sugar in their lifetime. Granted, this statistic usually is applied to younger patients taking insulin shots to stay alive over decades.
If efforts are made to keep blood sugar readings as close to the non-diabetic normal range as possible, that prediction rises to 15,000 episodes of low blood sugar in an average lifetime. No one is really keeping count, but anyone with diabetes of any duration most likely has experienced several low blood sugar events. Some happen daily.

http://www.mywesttexas.com/life/article_a589b59d-b203-5aed-b25d-60f316dd576a.html

 

[trophywench]

Severe low blood sugar is occurs the person cannot self-treat the problem because they are too impaired by the low blood sugar. This usually means a blood sugar level below 35 mg/dl, but the actual cutoff is different from person to person.

35mg/dl divide by 18 = 1.94

Therefore he is saying 'UNDER 2.0 mmol/L' - which is a fair enough level to put it at, really.

I mean I know I have treated myself at 1.6, 1.7, 1.8 before now, but I deny that Officer ......

 

[novorapidboi26]

I mean I know I have treated myself at 1.6, 1.7, 1.8 before now......

Not been that low in a very long time, but have been getting a lot 3.8s recently, so just on the line between making and adjustment and leaving it.............

 

[Robster65]

Have done below 1.3 allegedly by self, including times when fitting has started, but very scary and it's never happened really, I made it all up.

I would suggest there's never a time when you can't self-treat unless you have no symptoms and just crash out.

If you have warnings and have treatment, you should be able to get something in that will, in time, bring you up above the danger threshold so you can then risk moving your hand to get something more substantial.

Rob

 

[Northerner]

35mg/dl divide by 18 = 1.94

Therefore he is saying 'UNDER 2.0 mmol/L' - which is a fair enough level to put it at, really.
....

Well, it says 35-55 mg/dl, which I'm pretty sure would be quoted as 2-3 mmol/l in our units of measurement, so a moderate hypo of which I have had plenty over the years and have rarely troubled me 🙂

 

[Vicsetter]

This is another article that doesn't differentiate between Type 1s and 2s. As a T2 on Levemir, basal insulin, I don't expect to have a hypo, even when I was injecting twice a day I only had 3 hypos and they were all just below 4mmol. If you are doing bolus insulin injections I would expect the incidence of hypo to be much higher, especially for T1s.

 

[trophywench]

I do apologise Alan, I completely missed the bit that said that lower down!

I think your tolerance for lower BGs is greater when your overall BG is higher, such as sitting in the 8's all the while and you plummet to 2.4, you would be as incapable as Robster would be plummeing to 1.3, which obviously - we all would be if we ever got that low - which we never do .... 😎