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What is the appropriate timing for after meal reading

Kaha

Kaha

Well-Known Member
Messages
214
Location
Canada
Type of diabetes
Treatment type
Tablets (oral)
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Hypocrite
Can anybody advise what is the exact /appropriate time to test sugar level that corresponds after meal reading ? I usually take dinner in stages such as main meal ,then some fruits , nuts , tea.... all with certain intervals . So, it is almost two hours from the time I start eating when I finish my eating ( drink tea) . So, at what time should we test the sugar level ? 2 hours from the time we start the meal or 2 hours after we finish the last portion of meal/drink ? If I take the reading exactly after 2 hours since I started meal , I am afraid that the other items (fruits, nuts, tea) those were just eaten would have impact on readings . So, will it be appropriate reading to consider as after meal BS level?
 
I have read that some people advocate the two hours after the first bite rule but I never really understood that because of precisely what you describe in your post. So .....

1. Meal lengths vary so I have always gone with the two hours since I ate anything rule.

2 I am not too anal about the precise timing anyway. This is probably due to me having tested for so long that I take a close enough for cash attitude.
 
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Its 2 hrs after the last food, as its takes two hours for the food "spike" to recover. Mostly tests taken before this will not give you a good indication except for the impact of the food eaten.

I don't often eat a meal over an hour, when I do I'd not take much notice of readings until 2hrs past the last food intake.

If you do want to understand the impact of the food your eating then testing before the 2hrs will help with this.
 
So, what should be the desired sugar level after 2 hours for a T2 non insulin dependent?
 
@Kaha

Since everyone is different, you could do an experiment to see when a good time for you is to test. Assuming you have lots of strips and don't mind using them, you could test every 15 minutes after you have your typical 2 hour long meal and see where the peak is. Otherwise I think you are just guessing. I did this a few times with a carby meal and I peaked around one hour after eating (I didn't take two hours to eat, just 10 minutes), so now I test about an hour after eating rather than the officially recommended 2 hours. You may want to keep track of the time when you eat the carby bits of your meal.

As for what level you should aim for, that's a tricky question. Personally, I aim for levels that a healthy person (no insulin resistance, normal beta cells) would have, which I achieve by a very low carb diet.

Here's a useful discussion on this subject:

http://www.phlaunt.com/diabetes/16422495.php
 
Thks, nocrbs4Me. Let me share my experience from tonight`s dinner and BS results. I had Mutton Biriyani with fish fry ( reasonable quantity) exactly at 10 PM (start time) , finished by 1030 and had tea after that. in between 11PM to 1130, i had some fruits( guava and coconut) . Had a light walk of 10 minutes after 1030 and took my oral medication Janumet 1000/50. At about 7-30 had taken also some snacks like nuts,peas,rice crackers...with tea.I tested BS at 0015 (15 min after midnight,exactly 2 hours after eating high carb dinner ) and the reading was 6.8. I think it`s good and normal for me after such a heavy dinner . Also, you can see whatever I ate after Biriany did not have that much negative impact on BS reading .
So, any comments /conclusions from this??
 
My first comment is that one single reading gives no indication of what your peak reading was or when it occurred.

From the link I provided:

"Most normal people are under 100 mg/dl (5.5 mmol/L) two hours after eating."

So my second comment is that I bet if you cut down on the amount of carbs, you'd be closer to a normal reading at two hours.
 
According to NICE, the ideal reading after 2 hours should be < 8.5.

Can anyone advise me, how long the peaking will last after each meal. What happens if I take my reading after 2.5 hours, will there be any tremendous different in the readings?

There was once I took have my first reading at 7.8 and after 1/2 hr on the second reading it drops to 5.9, is it normal?
 
Lynn_L said:
According to NICE, the ideal reading after 2 hours should be < 8.5.

Can anyone advise me, how long the peaking will last after each meal. What happens if I take my reading after 2.5 hours, will there be any tremendous different in the readings?

There was once I took have my first reading at 7.8 and after 1/2 hr on the second reading it drops to 5.9, is it normal?
Click to expand...

Everybody is different. You need to use a few extra strips and see what a typical meal you eat does to you blood glucose over time. I don't think there is a "normal" for type 2 diabetics. Once the insulin kicks in, your blood glucose can drop quite quickly, but not that's necessarily true for everyone and depends on a lot off factors.

The NICE guidelines are nice, but you can certainly aim for having "normal" blood glucose levels - i.e. what a healthy person's would be.
 
Thanks. I will learn from your advise and do the extra strips.

Of the main topic, It is stated that "long term high readings could cause compilations". Can you also advise what it means by the long term - Does our daily meal peaking if within the guidelines affects us? I am kind of worry about the diabetic compilation, it is stressing me out a bit these days. Not a day have gone by without me thinking about the compilation as I am constantly reminder that diabetic tends to have leg compilations by my GP.
 
Lynn_L said:
Thanks. I will learn from your advise and do the extra strips.

Of the main topic, It is stated that "long term high readings could cause compilations". Can you also advise what it means by the long term - Does our daily meal peaking if within the guidelines affects us? I am kind of worry about the diabetic compilation, it is stressing me out a bit these days. Not a day have gone by without me thinking about the compilation as I am constantly reminder that diabetic tends to have leg compilations by my GP.
Click to expand...

Here's a couple of good discussions on what levels of blood glucose may cause damage:

http://www.phlaunt.com/diabetes/14045678.php

http://www.phlaunt.com/diabetes/15945839.php
 
Testing before a meal starts will give you a base line reading so you will know how the meal is effecting your control in general, one of the ways we are told to learn about the food we eat here in Canada is to eat to our meter, which means you eat as you would and you test every 30 minutes from when you stop eating up to the two hour mark (and in some cases up to the 4 hour mark if you are on meal time insulin).

This gives you a idea how the meal you ate is effecting your levels over the course of two to four hours. You do this staggered over the course of a couple of weeks to learn what food groupings do to you - or if you have the time/ability couple days straight (so you might well go though 20 strips in a day of doing this - which is pricy if your paying out of pocket, but helps greatly because you lean your insulin to carb ratio which comes in handy if your on insulin so you can take the right amount with a meal).

As to your original Q ... like other said it varies, to me your eating is closer to grazing and you'll not get an accurate reading because of it following the two hour mark deal, but doing the testing every 30 minutes you might get a better idea, no idea really. I know I graze on plants when I'm working from home and i'm always semi low (early to mid 4s) so not great but considering its not bad. I do worse when working in the filed where being in the high 2s mid 3s is more common.

My mom was diabetic all my life and 100% diet controlled she'd eat small meals throughout the day when I was younger to keep her levels even, last 10 years of her life she went vegetarian and ended up on two meals a day with normal glucose readings and non-diabetic normal A1C readings - she was T2.

As to complications that gets into the deal of having your glucose levels at higher levels outside of the times you are testing - which is harder to control for many who are not on insulin (and even us on insulin it can be an issue - the cgms can be a great thing for many), i know where told that after a meal 7 is the highests that is liked to see because higher then 7 for prolonged periods of time is what can cause damage over time (most common during sleep period to go high, which is why going to bed at a reasonable level can help).
 
Thanks Nyxks.I am as well a Canadian, so I know how expensive is to consume too many strips when you pay from your pocket. My insurance does not pay for strips being a diabetic non insulin dependent. . I disagree to some extent with what Nocrbs4Me says that we should try to behave like non diabetic and aim at getting numbers of our readings at Non diabetic levels . i am a T2 for last 9 years and do not think that I am able to reverse it completely . So, to me 6.8 bS found after 2 hours of heavy meal sounds not too bad to me at least it is in the range of some NICE guidelines referred by Lynn .
Also ,I am very interested to know how Nocrbs4me was able to reverse his diabetic as claimed by him in his post
 
Kaha said:
Thanks Nyxks.I am as well a Canadian, so I know how expensive is to consume too many strips when you pay from your pocket. My insurance does not pay for strips being a diabetic non insulin dependent. . I disagree to some extent with what Nocrbs4Me says that we should try to behave like non diabetic and aim at getting numbers of our readings at Non diabetic levels . i am a T2 for last 9 years and do not think that I am able to reverse it completely . So, to me 6.8 bS found after 2 hours of heavy meal sounds not too bad to me at least it is in the range of some NICE guidelines referred by Lynn .
Also ,I am very interested to know how Nocrbs4me was able to reverse his diabetic as claimed by him in his post
Click to expand...
To be fair, my HbA1c was not all that high, but I had peripheral neuropathy in my feet, so my blood glucose must have been pretty high for a while.

To make a long story short, I believe I reversed it by losing weight (about 40 pounds now), exercising and severely reducing carb intake. There are lots of other people on this forum that have done the same, with much higher HbA1c and fasting blood glucose levels to start than I had. The low carb really works for me - I am losing weight and my post meal blood glucose levels are in the normal range. About once a month I have a pasta meal (the same each time) and the first time last June it resulted in my blood glucose to go to diabetic levels. The last time a couple of weeks ago the same meal did not cause my blood glucose to go above what a normal healthy person's would. The last time I saw a doctor he said I should try going off metformin and see if my blood glucose stays normal without it. I won't claim to say I'm cured, but the diabetes definitely seems to be reversed, the difference being that I think if I went back to eating the government sanctioned diet of 45-65% carbs my blood glucose control would rapidly deteriorate. Last month I was on vacation and my carb increased to about 140 g per day from usually less than 75 g per day and my fasting blood glucose immediately started going up. After coming home and reducing the carbs again my fasting blood glucose went down again.

Of course not everyone will be successful at reversing their type 2 diabetes, but why not at least try?

Here's a good discussion on how people have done it:

http://www.phlaunt.com/diabetes/16535158.php

Unfortunately you'll have to ignore the advice to following the official government nutrition guide and eat far fewer carbs and more fat than they recommend. For me, a LCHF diet has also lowered my blood pressure, lowered my plasma triglycerides and improved my cholesterol numbers. By the way I am Canadian as well!
 
Kaha said:
Thks, nocrbs4Me. Let me share my experience from tonight`s dinner and BS results. I had Mutton Biriyani with fish fry ( reasonable quantity) exactly at 10 PM (start time) , finished by 1030 and had tea after that. in between 11PM to 1130, i had some fruits( guava and coconut) . Had a light walk of 10 minutes after 1030 and took my oral medication Janumet 1000/50. At about 7-30 had taken also some snacks like nuts,peas,rice crackers...with tea.I tested BS at 0015 (15 min after midnight,exactly 2 hours after eating high carb dinner ) and the reading was 6.8. I think it`s good and normal for me after such a heavy dinner . Also, you can see whatever I ate after Biriany did not have that much negative impact on BS reading .
So, any comments /conclusions from this??
Click to expand...
Very good after a Byryani very good indeed to be at 6.8. i would shoot up to a 9+ on that. lucky you.
 
Nocrbs4me ,good to know that you are a Canadian too. I really appreciate your determination that helped a lot to reverse your diabetes . Also, I can see you can monitor the changes very well. You have said very well that reversal does not mean cured , can you please share with us for how long the BS should stay in control so that we could say diabetes is reversed . I think, the duration should be quite long for that. For shorter time period I would prefer the term diabetes "In control " rather than saying 'Reversed" . To me reverse sounds to some extent like "Cured"
 
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