Do I have diabetes?

[Momma T]

Hello everyone,
I was just yesterday called in to the surgery to see the diabetes nurse after routine blood tests at a new surgery after a house move.
She told me that my HBA1C was registering 48 and that meant I was pre diabetic. Shocked doesn’t come into it!! So straight home and on to good old google I found an overload of information with some very confusing numbers! I did notice though that according to google 48 is the starting point for diabetes……42-47 is pre diabetic. Does that mean I am not pre but full on diabetic? I’m so confused and worried!

 

[Rokaab]

In the UK you are correct 42-47 is considered pre-diabetic and 48+ is considered diabetic, though note that there's very little difference between 47 and 48, and there is always a margin of error so you could be either side of that arbitrary line in actuality.

But yes 48 would normally be considered as diabetic in the UK I'm afraid

 

[KennyA]

Hello everyone,
I was just yesterday called in to the surgery to see the diabetes nurse after routine blood tests at a new surgery after a house move.
She told me that my HBA1C was registering 48 and that meant I was pre diabetic. Shocked doesn’t come into it!! So straight home and on to good old google I found an overload of information with some very confusing numbers! I did notice though that according to google 48 is the starting point for diabetes……42-47 is pre diabetic. Does that mean I am not pre but full on diabetic? I’m so confused and worried!

The way it works is that the reading is used as the diagnostic test. I'm assuming you have no other symptoms - many people have diabetic symptoms long before their blood glucose reaches 48. many have no symptoms after their glucose gets to that level or higher. The reason it's set at 48 is that diabetic retinopathy (damage to the eyes) is rarely found beneath that level. They may well ask you to have another reading. This is because there's a level of error in the readings and they like to have a second reading that confirms the first. Your DN might be hoping that the 48 reading is a bit higher than it "really" is. If so, you have a chance to do something about it.

The good news is that many of us here lowered our blood glucose levels very quickly through low-carb eating. Mine was back at normal levels within four months, starting from slightly higher than you.

Carbohydrates when digested are sugars. Type 2 Diabetes is basically your body being unable to handle carbohydrates/sugars, so therefore it often stores them as fat and runs with much higher levels of sugar in the blood than is good for you. It's often the high sugar levels that cause the damage, not the diabetes itself.

If I was you I would want to avoid a formal diagnosis. This can bring with it unwelcome things like an increase in insurance premiums etc. Once diagnosed, you'll always have that label even if your blood glucose returns to normal levels.

This link is really useful: https://josekalsbeek.blogspot.com/2019/11/the-nutritional-thingy.html

Best of luck. This forum is helpful and almost everyone on here is going through or has gone through what you're experiencing.