Fasting Test help

@Grannie75,

There are many different factors that can cause your BG to be higher or lower than what you'd "like".

First of all, your meter isn't 100% accurate, it has an error margin of around +/- 15%, 95% of the time - in accordance with the latest ISO '13 standards (assuming your meter is new). So what does that mean? It means that an actual BG of 6mmol/l could in fact be a 5.1 or a 7.1.

http://www.diabetes.co.uk/blood-glucose-meters/blood-glucose-meter-accuracy.html

A lot of us also experience a BG rise as soon as we start moving around, it's a natural bodily response which is more obvious in diabetics and pre-diabetics due to our bodies not being able to regulate the glucose properly.

Another thing to note is that diabetes is not linear. What I mean by that is there will be changes from day to day, some subtle and some not so.

There is also the possibilty (not to worry you) that your diabetes may be progressing. This however cannot be confirmed unless you have an HbA1c test and can compare that to your last one.

Test strips can also loose their accuracy if they've been exposed to heat or humidity - that's always a possibility. However, from the small discrepancy in BG values you've outlined, that shouldn't be the case

Regards,
Grant

Grannie75 said:

What can cause changes in the morning test as I am getting higher every day, but feel that my diet is much the same every day, so are there any other events that can make this happen?
On 24/25th Jan I was 5.9 - 5.8 then yesterday 6.5 and this morning 7.1. The only difference that I think between the earlier results and the last 2 days is that on 24/25th I got up to use the bathroom before the test and yesterday and today I didn't. Can getting up for a couple of minutes have this effect?

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By not going to the bathroom these last 2 days, are you saying you didn't wash your hands? If you didn't that could explain the higher readings - the tiniest microscopic bit of something on your fingers can affect the result.

Our morning fasting tests can be affected by many different things. A restless night can be one, having a nice cosy lie-in can be another, then there is stress, and also there are things such as a rise due to too much protein the previous day. It is best all round not to get hung up on morning fasting levels - they are too unpredictable. Just concentrate on meal time testing, and if you just want to keep check on how you are doing in general, the test before your evening meal is more reliable.

Grannie75 said:

Thanks for your answer.
I tend to get up several times during the night ( maybe an age thing or maybe because I am drinking more water) so I washed my hands around 6am and then went back to sleep and did the test around 7.30am, so not sure if I needed to wash again. I don't fully understand the 'before your feet touch the ground' I have seen mentioned several times with regards to the fasting test, so didn't know if this was literally while you were still in bed, or if it was the same as get up and wash hands first.
Yes also the last 3 days have been more stressful than usual due to a family crisis, so maybe this could have something to do with it. Maybe I am reading too much into the tests and hopefully when the family problem has eased a little then I will find the tests also go down a little

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I believe some people use alcohol wipes to clean their hands. This isn't advised in the meter instructions I have, which state wash hands in warm soapy water then dry thoroughly, so that necessitates getting out of bed, washing hands, testing. You should really do it every time you test, immediately beforehand.

The last 3 stressful days may well be the reason. Record the results, make notes, move on!

to my morning blood glucose it matters how much excercise I did the day before, if I did too much and too late in the evening my blood glucose gets higher, but then lower later in the day

if I eat really much protein it also gets a bit higher...

if I hardly sleep (like 2-3 hours sleep ) it is up with about 1 mmol... or even more...

if I eat more than 200 grams of carbs more days in a row, my morning numbers gets higher than 6 and even 6.8 mmol

Then there are those of us with physiological insulin resistance, eating very low carb forces fasting levels higher.... This could be possible if your diet has changed drastically.

I find that FBG is the last of daily tests to fall in line following healthy changes but the first to rise when I eat what I shouldn't

Bluetit1802 said:

By not going to the bathroom these last 2 days, are you saying you didn't wash your hands? If you didn't that could explain the higher readings - the tiniest microscopic bit of something on your fingers can affect the result.

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That happened to me once when my kids were little, I had just finished feeding one and I had baby food all over my hands as my son seemed to think it was funny spittling his food out as I was trying to shovel it in - any way I tested myself a brief time later and forgot to wash my hands and my BG reading was so high the glucometer just said HIGH - I clued in pretty quick washed my hands and tested again and it was in the 4s - quite a difference

My FBG is generally higher if I've had a good sleep, and lower if I've woken in the night, especially if I've gotten up once or more. I have a problem with "dawn phenomenon" liver dumping and I think that when I am up in the night my regular internal clock gets disrupted and the liver dump doesn't happen to the same extent. If you keep testing and keep seeing this pattern on waking/nonwaking nights, possibly you have something similar going on?

That's a good question. I don't know of any research on that kind of thing--would be interested to see it. I know there's been new studies on shiftwork and in particular night shifts (especially for women) appearing to be linked with a variety of health issues, and the theory is that the disruption to our "normal" schedules is to blame.

Anecdotally, I do notice that I have much more difficulty with time zone changes when I travel now, and I think it messes up my normally pretty controlled glucose to have my schedule shifted.