Spike numbers

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kathy s

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I'm testing regularly and have found lots of things I'm ok with but how many points is a spike?
Sometimes my sugars are still high so when I eat they go up further. How much of a rise is a spike? Have had noticeably lower readings recently though. Sorry for daft question!
 
No such thing as a silly question @kathy s 🙂

I guess it depends person to person. There won’t be a ‘clinical’ definition - and while I know there is research that shows reducing both glucose variability (maximum high and maximum low) and glucose instability (how wobbly your BGs are) are significant ways of improving glucose outcomes, I’m not sure there are agreed definitions of what ‘officially’ constitutes a ‘spike’

Looking at CGM results from healthy individuals without diabetes might give you some helpful ideas?


Personally I’m not sure there are any absolutes, and in a sense I thunk it’s a combination of rise from pre-meal BG, but also total BG reached.

I prefer to stay in single figures for as much time as I can, and find that aiming for a ‘meal rise‘ of 4-5 or less helps (if I’m starting in range). If I can keep the meal rise to 3, so much the better 🙂
 
When you eat your blood glucose will go up as your body metabolises the food you eat and different components of your meal with be metabolised at different rates. If you are just finger pricking then testing after 2 hours will give you an indication that the meal has been well tolerated if the increase from before you eat is no more than 2-3mmol/l , once levels come down then the ranges to be aiming at are 4-7mmol/l morning readings and before meals and no more than 8-8.5mmol/l 2 hours post meal.
Obviously of you are using a Libre then you are more aware of what is happening following eating but I suppose those same criteria apply.
This generally applies if you are dietary managed with or without oral medication, if on insulin then this may not be the case.
 
At the moment I'm dietary and one empagliflozin ( I didn't tolerate metformin) I'm now ranging anywhere from low fives to sevens when finger pricking. So I was concerned when I get a 7 before eating of the rise to come! I've tried 4 new potatoes with broccoli and chicken and sugars rose less than 2,so I guess I can tolerate a small amount of potato, just trying other foods as with cauliflower cheese and cauliflower rice im. Beginning to resemble a cauliflower but I do like it and just over 2 months I've lost a stone in weight! ( I wasn't overweight to start though) I have my 1st check in a few weeks and I'm quite nervous!
 
kathy s said:
At the moment I'm dietary and one empagliflozin ( I didn't tolerate metformin) I'm now ranging anywhere from low fives to sevens when finger pricking. So I was concerned when I get a 7 before eating of the rise to come! I've tried 4 new potatoes with broccoli and chicken and sugars rose less than 2,so I guess I can tolerate a small amount of potato, just trying other foods as with cauliflower cheese and cauliflower rice im. Beginning to resemble a cauliflower but I do like it and just over 2 months I've lost a stone in weight! ( I wasn't overweight to start though) I have my 1st check in a few weeks and I'm quite nervous!
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You sound to be doing fine, you have kept your meal rises to around 2 so all looks good there, don't be too impatient, bringing down levels more gradually is kinder on your eyes and nerves and your body can adjust to lower levels.
 
What if your sugars go down? I was 7 exactly before dinner just tested 2 hours later and I'm 6.8 ( checked twice) I was expecting up not down as it wax the forbidden mash, I've not had it since diagnosis!!
 
kathy s said:
What if your sugars go down? I was 7 exactly before dinner just tested 2 hours later and I'm 6.8 ( checked twice) I was expecting up not down as it wax the forbidden mash, I've not had it since diagnosis!!
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Those readings are really the same as monitors have a allowed degree of variability so any particular reading represents a small range.
Looking at trends rather than absolute values are more realistic.
 
kathy s said:
What if your sugars go down? I was 7 exactly before dinner just tested 2 hours later and I'm 6.8 ( checked twice) I was expecting up not down as it wax the forbidden mash, I've not had it since diagnosis!!
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That just suggests your body coped very well with the meal, and that by 2hrs your BG were more or less back to where you started 🙂
 
I know it was only small difference just hot a little excited if I can have mash occasionally! I tried 1 Yorkshire pudding earlier in the week and that's a no no!
 
kathy s said:
I know it was only small difference just hot a little excited if I can have mash occasionally! I tried 1 Yorkshire pudding earlier in the week and that's a no no!
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This will all give you the knowledge both about what foods you can tolerate and what is not so good or guide you where you can perhaps try a reduced portion, so half a Yorkshire pud.
 
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