What urine ketone testing strips to buy?

[resander]

I am thinking about going on low-carb keto diet and use urine strips to measure if/when I reach ketosis state. Size: about 100 strips/container.

There are many suppliers of strips at amazon.com, but I cannot decide which to choose.

Advice appreciated.

 

[bulkbiker]

Don't bother.. once you are in ketosis your body stops wasting ketones so the strips no longer show any ketones present.
If you really want to measure get a blood ketone meter. That's assuming you are T2,.. any chance you could update your profile? Makes life so much easier for everyone else.

 

[resander]

Not so much worried about wasting ketones, rather about not producing any or producing dangerously too much.

Better late than never, Profile now updated...

 

[bulkbiker]

Not so much worried about wasting ketones, rather about not producing any or producing dangerously too much.

What I mean is the ketone pee strips have been known to stop reporting the presence of ketones in the urine when you are in fact in ketosis. That's why a blood ketone meter is better as when you are in ketosis blood ketones will be present whereas ketones might not be in urine.
Unless you are a T1 or don't produce insulin then you are highly unlikely to produce too many.

 

[Robbity]

I used Ketonix for a short while, but never actually finished the pack - as I stopped seeing any waste ketones as soon as my body started using them - as a little research told me.

Just reduce your carbs down to 20-25g a day for a couple of weeks and you're guaranteed to get there.

Dangerously high ketone levels (i.e.ketoacidosis) generally occurs when you have high ketone levels, high glucose levels (unlikely to happen with very low carb/ketogenic diets), combined with a severe lack of insulin. It's more likely to be a problem for T1s than T2s, but see detailed information on our main site here: :https://www.diabetes.co.uk/diabetes-complications/diabetic-ketoacidosis.html

Robbity

 

[resander]

During the last 18 months I have identified meals that I like and that leave the blood sugars in the range 6.6-7.6 mmol/L 2 hours after eating. I want to modify these meals to ketogenic style to see if I can make the blood sugars come down a bit more.

I have read (do not remember where) that ketogenic diet beginners should test for ketosis/ketones several times per day to see if/when ketosis has started. That would be expensive, a pound or more per measurement if using a blood ketone meter. Cost per measurement using urine ketone strips is around 5-7 pence.

Have just ordered 150 KETONE urine Test strips by UK-Keto from amazom.com. Will report performance when I get that far.

 

[AloeSvea]

Not so much worried about wasting ketones, rather about not producing any or producing dangerously too much..

As the body switching between using glucose-energy and fats-energy is a natural and our species/mammal thing (I think it is common to all mammals to some degree?) (just looked it up - even in fish apparently!), I wouldn't worry about worrying if your body is doing it - it will be! Given that you lower or drop the carbs enough.

It's like breathing? You don't have to concentrate on it unless you are doing it intentionally to meditate and achieve a special brain wave phenonmenon - our bodies just do it! Is my understanding.

As for producing dangerously too much ketones - that is for those with blood glucose/insulin regulating problems that go beyond 'simple type two', as in the autoimmune disease ones?. and hypos are a problem for type twos due to medications dangerously dropping the glucose levels, not the 'simple type two' problems that we ordinarily have. Isn't this right?

I don't measure my ketones regularly outside of a big experiments, just to see what is happening in the ol' body. But, saying that, I have invested rather a lot in what I call 'pee stix' (or the ketostix), and now in a meter that can do both glucose and ketone measuring. The keto measuring strips - oh my goodness - I practically needed to borrow from the bank for those! Gee! I hadn't really looked online closely enough to see if I could actually afford to test my ketones with a meter regularly. (Well, and not invest in good quality meat and seafood, and cheese, which is what I am doing.)

But I did a wee double-test last night, and tested with a pee stick, and with one of my like-gold ketone test strips on the new meter, and they came up the same. Interesting! (ie low level ketones present in both pee and blood.) So will stick with the vastly cheaper, but still not cheap, pee stix, at least until I win the lottery?

I hope this ketone-measuring rave has been somewhat helpful?

 

[resander]

@AloeSvea
I agree with all you said and will not, as keto-diet beginner, invest in a blood ketone meter. Going to use the urine-ketone measurement sticks I just bought at amazon.

 

[bulkbiker]

@AloeSvea
I agree with all you said and will not, as keto-diet beginner, invest in a blood ketone meter. Going to use the urine-ketone measurement sticks I just bought at amazon.

That's great but just be aware that if they stop reporting ketones it might not necessarily mean you aren't in ketosis.. or alternatively it may.. but you won't know. Just keep carbs down to a minimum and you should be fine.