curioser and curioser

[the_anticarb]

As some of you regulars will now I have recently converted to low carbing after being a total carbivore all my life. Had really good bg's and reduced my lantus from 28 u to 24u, also replaced the novorapid with metformin. Here's the strange thing. Today I forgot to take my lantus and metformin, as I thought I had it in my bag but I'd left it at home. So I went all day with no medication, had a yogurt for breakfast and a prawn and avocado salad with some low carb crisps for lunch. Then when I got in and tested my blood at 5pm, it was 5.7. I was expecting it to be much higher as I'd had no lantus since my injection on wednesday morning. Does this mean I may eventually be able to come off the lantus completedly if i continue to low carb?? I understand that I won't need the fast acting if i low carb but thought I would still need the background insulin.

Gina

 

[hanadr]

It all depends on the condition of your beta cells.

 

[the_anticarb]

I have a strange diagnosis (or lack therof) - not type 1, not type 2, doc thought it could be H-N alpha monogenic but test came back negative. The best they can say is that it's likely to be an as yet unidentified monogenic (single gene mutation) diabetes - but as they can't identify the gene they can't tell me how my diabetes is likely to manifest!

 

[Trinkwasser]

One thing which is always worth looking at is your lipids, trigs/HDL ratio is related to insulin resistance.

Mine went from nearly 7 to under 0.5, dealing with IR if you have it can make the insulin stretch much further. Unfortunately it's not possible to predict how you may behave in future if you're undergoing some form of "honeymoon". It may be temporarily removing the load on your pancreas with the lantus has enabled it to respond better. Many Type 2s can reduce or eliminate medications with a sufficiently low carb diet plus reduced IR but whether or not you're that lucky I wouldn;t like to predict, sorry!

 

[lowcarbfan]

Hi all

Can someone explain how to measure potential insulin resistance?
My partner is Type 2 and no meds.We would like to take care of any remaining Beta cells.
We have low-carb lifestyle even if the whole family think we are crazy-people. My mother, along with many others, insist that huge quantities of potatoes/rice/bread etc have essential, unspecified, 'stuff' in them. She even saves clippings from the Daily Mail to prove her point.

 

[the_anticarb]

You have to ask your consultant to get your partner tested for blood insulin level - think it is done as a fasting test - if he has lots of insulin in blood but still cant get good control then he's likely to be insulin resistant

 

[Trinkwasser]

They don't generally measure insulin directly, you may have more luck requesting a c-peptide test. Gold standard is an insulin clamp test where they infuse insulin and glucose. If you can get a Full Lipid Panel you can estimate from the trigs/HDL ratio but many PCTs only permit TChol which is a waste of time, but cheap. Worth asking though, see what you are permitted.

 

[the_anticarb]

yes but they can measure serum insulin levels, I had this done as they weren't sure if I was type one or two and said I was producing a little insulin myself, but only very little. So it's worth asking your consultant if they can do this and if not, as trinkwasser has said, there are other options

 

[Trinkwasser]

yes but they can measure serum insulin levels, I had this done as they weren't sure if I was type one or two and said I was producing a little insulin myself, but only very little. So it's worth asking your consultant if they can do this and if not, as trinkwasser has said, there are other options

You were lucky! You can plug the numbers into a HOMA calculator

http://www.musc.edu/dfm/RCMAR/InsulinSens.html