Missed Metformin Dose

Inchindown said:

I missed a single dose of metformin last night before bedtime.

When I woke up this morning my blood glucose way above my normal level.

Throughout the day my levels continued to creep up and reached a peak of 13.3 at around 1700 after not having eaten since about 10am.

My levels have started to fall again and was 10.1 at 1830. I still haven't eaten.

My question is does my abnormal rise in glucose levels seem normal for missing a single 500mg dose of metformin.

Click to expand...

The only way you would know is if it happens again. However I wouldnt advise missing your medication.
Are those high bgs typical of your readings before metformin treatment?
My bgs are affected when I miss one of my tablets thou.

I suspect your BG rise is due to a liver dump because you are not eating. It is quite common for diabetics (especially the newly diagnosed) to see a rise in BG and stop eating in a panic. Only to see their BG rise further. So they still don't eat. Meanwhile their body is scraping around the nooks and crannies trying to generate some energy because there is a crisis. Quite often eating a small meal with cause the BG to go down again, which is counter intuitive.

Metformin isn't a BG regulator like insulin or most of the other pills. It is a long term cumulative drug which reduces glucose production by the liver a little, and reduces glucose uptake from the gut a little. However it is not fast acting and generally makes very little difference to BG levels on its own.

So missing a dose should not on its own cause your BG to rise, and taking an extra pill shouldn't make your BG go down immediately.

This is not normal for a missed dose of Matformin, unless you are very stressed about missing the dose.

it is not that bad if it is only a single day , the maximum dose of metformin is 2000 mg, if I did miss one the day before I might take it the next day if my number raised to such a high level.. but in my case I know I never hypo ...like never ever .... not the last 10 years , and I only got too low while drinking a lot of red wine in my younger days, I don´t like to do that anymore ... not more than a few glasses nowadays..

you shouldn´t worry too much if this is only a single day, but of cause, it is less harmful to be in a non-diabetic level, and that is most easily done by eating very low amounts of carbs almost all days..

as ickihun says metformin mostly helps slowing the level of glucose produced by one's liver ... and that is maybe only under 10% of ones glucose in one's blood , most blood glucose comes from what we eat of all kinds of carbs ...

try to stricktly count you grams of carbs in a day , and try to be under 150 grams in total in a whole day.. then you can more easily control your blood glucose level.

my number raise around 1.5 mmol if I forget my daily dose of 2 x 850 mg

I think it differs from one person to the other how much metformin restricts our liver