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Prediabetes My dr tells me I have prediabetes and that my A1c will rise.

G

Gardengnome

Well-Known Member
Messages
134
Location
uk
Type of diabetes
Don't have diabetes
Treatment type
Diet only
Dislikes
going to a gym
His reason for saying this is because The A1c a year ago was 41mmol/mol, which I only recently discovered. I know this is the top end of normal but it was still a shock and the dr agreed to do it again - it was exactly the same. Over the past year I have lost a lot of weight and altered my eating and exercise habits and have a bmi of <19, all the things I would have been advised to do had this been picked up a year ago. The dr says the improved lifestyle has prevented it from rising but that it will rise: he is the main diabetes dr in the practice so I am inclined to believe him. He tells me to come back in a year to have it done again. so if I do that and the A1c has risen to 48% I have a diagnosis of T2 ?

I have decided after some deliberation to buy myself a glucose meter and check levels myself; if I don't do this how can I know where I am going wrong. To perform the home fasting test I believe I should take a fasting drop of blood on waking, then take a glucose drink [lucozade?] and test again in 1 hr and then again in another hour. What numbers should I be looking for? I would then like to use the meter to discover which foods give me a spike throughout the day. . Also before I do a fasting test should I eat a high carb diet for several days? I realise any result is not accurate but it would give me time to discover myself what I can do before I have the next A1c and of course there would be no numbers on my clinical notes that could be inconvenient - to say the least! If I do nothing I could be sleepwalking into a disaster.

Which meter should I buy and what is the best way to go about it?
 
Hi and welcome, using high glucose drinks to experiment with testing is a really bad thing, you need to test after fasting and before food and 2 hours after food so as you can see what foods spike your blood sugar. As for meters I use the iBGStar and BGStar as both meters can be connected to an iphone iPod or ipad, it also comes with 50 strips, and the strips you can get from boots for 19.99 for 50 but there are others that are cheaper to run


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I think the SD Codefree is the cheapest to buy and to run. It reads a little high but all you are interested in relative figures, ie before and after foods, to learn which are better for you. I wouldn't worry if you do go upto 48, its possible to get back down from that. many of us have been very much higher.

Don't be worried, just start to think a bit more about what you eat and do take a little exercise every day. You don't have to pump iron or train for marathons, just a brisk walk or bike ride or swimming is very good. Short periods of daily activity is better that 2 long sessions per week. You are not training, you are just getting the blood to digest the food properly, walking off a meal or taking your daily constitutional.
 
Thank you Crimsonclient and Yorksman for your help and comments. There is a wealth of choice I see for meters and the SD Codefree does get some rather bad write ups, but as you say it is only relative figures at this stage I think. If I just ignore prediabetes I could be in for a shock at the next A1c. When I was told I had high blood pressure I decided to lose weight and exercise more; so I walk into the village for a newspaper every day with the dog, a round trip of 2 miles.

The dr said that "Although Type 2 diabetes can be brought on and exacerbated by an unhealthy lifestyle there are plenty of fit and healthy people such as myself who contract diabetes and have it to deal with." he went on to say that "They don't treat prediabetes except by lifestyle changes and really you just have to wait for the numbers to rise [and they will !]". As a postscript he added that he would have the Metformin ready when they did.

As things are at present I haven't a clue what the day to day figures are and am vague about counting carbs.. I thought I was eating low carb but now I'm not so sure. Clearly I have a lot to learn and certainly I eat too much fruit. Testing will be a completely new game for me but should be interesting! If it keeps the wolf from the door then it has to be a good exercise.
 
All sorts. Always grapefruit for breakfast then through the day perhaps an orange, an apple, banana, grapes, figs in season, which they aren't of course but last Autumn we had a massive crop of our own. Also plums, raspberries, black currants. You name it - I should have been a monkey!! Obviously not all of them all the time!! I've just got a small carb counter book and am shocked at the amount of carbs in things. Today was a bad day for me and as a rough estimate I have had over 200 carbs. that's a lot isn't it? Actually I really don't have a clue about the numbers, more homework to do!
 
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