Hb1Ac

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Jules W

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Type 2
Hi!

I’ve had type 2 diabetes for two years and every time I’ve been given an Hb1Ac result it’s been given as a percentage e.g. 48% at last year’s annual Nurse Practitioner review. However when I went to see my Consultant Rheumatologist a few days ago, he said my latest result was 5.5. Can anyone explain the connection between the two types of result and if the latest test shows a worse result than last year please? I should have asked him to explain but by the time I took in the difference he was on his feet, holding the door open and saying “See you next year” .....

Thanks
 
He's given you it in the old scale. On that 48 would be 6.5 (that's the one I remember). Diabetes UK had a converter on it's website someplace. Except they've kept changing their website and I don't know where it is now.
 
Welcome to the forum Jules from a fellow T2.
 
I've double checked two different sources and both give the same result. Your 5.5 is equivalent to 37, which is well inside the normal range of less than 42. So very well done - you should be thrilled. As Ralph-YK said, your previous result was 48% or 6.5, which was only just in the diabetic range, and actually the same as mine currently! I hope my next result is as good as yours.
 
Just to clarify. The 48 figure was not a percentage it was probably mmol/mol. The 5.5 value was probably the percentage value. These numbers are the 'new' and 'old' measures for HbA1c which gives a sort of average of your blood glucose levels over the past twelve weeks.

However, to confuse matters, it is possible that the 5.5 value, but in units of mmol/L, could have been a spot Blood Glucose measure.

So, measurement units are important, otherwise, confusion may ensue! 🙂
 
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The HbA1c test, used to be called the Glycosulated Haemoglobin test. (Ah that's the 'Hb' bit then!) and measures how much glucose floating round in the bloodstream, has stuck to your red blood cells (haemoglobin) over the last few months.

If glucose is floating about 'spare' in the bloodstream it means there's far too much going in (via the mouth normally!) for the body to use. If the body doesn't have diabetes - one way or another it ends up as fat either on the outside, under the skin or around your bodily organs the latter of which is more dangerous to life because it slows that/those organ(s) down too much to properly function. Oooer! - we need all of em every second of every minute of every day - except the appendix LOL

The human body is such a complicated machine that it's often a complete wonder to me that it ever functions properly at all. Yet when it does - we never spare it a thought, do we? 😱
 
Sounds like a great result. Well done!
 
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