• Guest - w'd love to know what you think about the forum! Take the 2025 Survey »

Bedtime BG?

Eldorado

Well-Known Member
Messages
168
Location
Buckinghamshire
Type of diabetes
Type 1
Treatment type
Insulin
Dislikes
Diabetes.
I'd be interested to know what sort of BG most people are happy to go to bed with.
I like to be 10 as that means no hypo in the night, but I'm wondering if it's too high. I've tried reducing the pm dose by one unit but then I was too high in the morning. If I'm 10 at bedtime I'll be 4-5 when I wake up, which is fine.
A few months ago I split my Lantus. I do 6 units twice a day at 8.30. This seems to work fine, I'm just wondering about the bedtime BG.
 
5.5 for me.....

that's my target all day every day...........

obviously people are going to be scared of hypos, but it is possible to achieve the correct basal overnight and hold steady........

you should maybe try and give the Lantus before bed instead of the perfect 12 hour split.....

when you reduced it by 1 unit, what was your morning reading?

you could inquire about half unit pens....
 
I'd say that 10 before bed and a drop of 5-6 mmol/l overnight was not where you want to be. The 10 is really too high. Your basal, over a five hour period when fasted shouldn't drop more than 1.7 mmol/l, so you really ought to do a proper basal test. http://www.salforddiabetescare.co.uk/index2.php?nav_id=1007

Here's my discussion of fiddling about with basal http://www.diabetes.co.uk/forum/thr...pefully-providing-some-lessons-learned.70039/

What you may find is that you need less basal overnight than during the day, so you may want to look at how you achieve that.
 
They say if your basal insulin is set at the right dose then your fasting bg levels shouldn't fluctuate by more than 1.6mmol/l, you can get half unit pens (JuiniorStar) and by using one might make all the difference to your night-time bg levels, failing that ask if you can go on the once a day basal called Tresiba.

Personally I like to be around 5.5 before bed but below 7 wherever possible, last night I went to bed with a bg level of 5.9 and woke to a level of 5.6 (but I'm on a pump and have fine tuned my basal rates to get this as tight as possible).
 
It depends what I've been doing in the day, frankly. I may have my basal set perfectly for a fairly inactive day, but if I have been doing sport my blood sugar can drop during the night. So, for example, last night before bed my blood sugar was 4.7. This morning, when I got up, it was 4.7. Seems perfect? But at dawn it was 5.0, and before I went to bed I ate an apple - about 20g carbs. If I hadn't I would have hypo'd, I'm sure. I knew because I had been fairly active in the evening. If I had done more vigorous sport during the day, I would have pushed my blood sugar up to 7.0 before bed. An alternative is to reduce your basal rate by some percentage or other over night, but I am less skilled at judging that so far. But I agree that 10 is too high, and your basal probably needs reduction. But when Type 1s are "hypo-averse" and keeping their blood sugars high, it can be because they haven't learned to manage the combination of exercise and dosing of insulin. It is predictable, once you realize the relationship is there. But you have to see it first.
 
Cookies are required to use this site. You must accept them to continue using the site. Learn More.…