Blood sugar testing

(Jennibc) #1

In this blog post, Dr Ede references a study where participants use a continual glucose monitor. I am wondering how many of you have tried that. Was it more valuable than pricking your finger an hour after everything you ate to see what it did your blood sugar. I am considering doing the finger pricking method for a bit to see what happens but wonder if the continual testing would be worth it.

I am inspired after a 10 day road trip to the upper midwest where I ended up putting on over 6 pounds despite my working very hard to stay on the plan. I have a feeling there was a LOT of hidden sugar in food. I did have dessert twice but I did that on a trip back in the summer and still only gained 4 pounds which I took off in under a week. And on that trip I had pasta and bread a couple of times. This gain really shocked me. I am glad to be back home where I am preparing all my own food again. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/diagnosis-diet/201812/the-number-one-tool-improving-your-health-year

(Lynne McGrath) #2

I tried the Free Style Freedom system and found it very unreliable. It was measuring 10-15 units lower than the traditional finger stick method. It’s also very expensive. Initial cost was $250 which included the meter and three discs. Thereafter was $75 a month for three discs which barely lasted 10 days each and some of them fell off before it was time to change it to a new one. Not worth it in my book

(Full Metal KETO AF) #3

I’m dealing with the beginning of what my doctor called post transplant diabetes. Started keto because of very high BG levels after fasting (over 200). I also had concerns over my BG not going down as quickly as I had hoped. I expected an immediate improvement after 10 days or so without the sugar and carbs. Well thing don’t work quite that way. Several folks advised me about the 24 hour BG monitor with software that allows you to see how BG is throughout the day. It checks every 15 minutes. Since things are slowly getting better for me I filed that away for future use if I don’t correct things on my own. But some people swear by it so if you think that it’s a fit for you to have that much analysis of your condition I say go for it.

(Bob M) #4

I used the FreeStyle Libre system, bought one year of sensors, about $65/month, each sensor lasted 14 days (assuming it stayed on for the whole time, which happened about 8 or 9 times out of ten).

You can learn stuff like this:

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This was a meal before Thanksgiving, I had soup from a sushi place and sashimi. The soup had only shrimp and vegetables, but caused a blood sugar rise from about 80 (about 4.4, where 4.0 is the bottom of the grey band) to about 126 (7.0*18, right near the 6.5). These are my notes from that day:

“Dinner around 7pm (1900) was seafood salad, hot and sour soup and sashimi, with some extra dried meat. This caused way more blood sugar rise than I thought it would. After that was two pieces of ice cream pie (about 9pm), note the low blood sugar. First solid line on left is 1800.”

Here’s another, a breakfast after going to church (this is the only time I eat breakfast):

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What happens when you fast then eat a huge wallop of protein?

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This is what happens when you eat real pizza (a high blood sugar for a very long time):

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I used my system to test many things, including massive amounts of protein (120+, 160+ grams in ONE meal).

It’s very difficult to make these tests without a continuous glucose monitor.

(Bob M) #5

Just to highlight this, a dinner from a sushi place of “seafood salad, hot and sour soup and sashimi” causes as much blood sugar rise as does “two pieces of ice cream pie”. That finding would not be possible without a CGM (continuous glucose monitor).

Also, after using my CGM, I realized that my blood sugar profile looks like this:

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My blood sugar goes up from about midnight or so until about noon, then goes down all day until midnight or so. There are of course “bumps” in this caused by eating, but I have multiple months of data showing this exact same profile. I could not have determined this profile without a CGM.

(Full Metal KETO AF) #6

I cooked Asian food for a living most of my adult life. Chinese and Japanese foods have lots of hidden carbs and sugars in general. For instance Chinese soups almost always use sugar to balance the salt (and heat if chilies are involved). The foods are usually trying to stimulate the whole tongue, sweet, salty, sour, bitter and the elusive umami flavor which is artificial as MSG or naturally present in certain foods. Think tomatoes, mushrooms, seafood, very fresh pork and many others including certain veggies.

(Todd Allen) #7

I’m intrigued by CGM but being thrifty I’ve yet to try it. I’ve done a lot of finger prick testing and it can get one pretty far. When I have a reason to closely track my blood sugar I can do it though most of the time I don’t feel like I need to. I probably miss some things that CGM would catch but I doubt it would add up to much change in how I eat, exercise and otherwise manage my health and fitness. My first few finger pricks were super valuable, I learned I had a functionally diabetic blood sugar response to my near daily fruit smoothie. That prompted major change. Since then it’s mostly just been fine tuning.

#8

I think a CGM would be cool. But I’m not metabolically deranged enough to justify the expense.

A glucometer was instrumental in helping me figure out how my body handled the foods I ate. I wasn’t interested in pricking my finger ad infinitum, so I took a methodological approach. I conducted carefully controlled n=1 experiments to determine my response to beef, fish, chicken and pork. I determined the amount of LC veggies I could consume before triggering a significant BG response. I determined how my BG responds to high caloric consumption of each macro individually. With that information, I can make meals and estimate the impact on my BG without testing every time.

I occasionally test after a meal, but mostly I test myself once a day, first thing in the morning, after I weigh myself. In general, the daily fluctuation in my morning BG is positively correlated to the fluctuation in my morning weight. For example, when my BG increased from 74 to 108, I gained 5 lbs. I don’t have all the information that a CGM could provide, but I have sufficient enough information to act on. Like not eating black eye peas and cornbread on a regular basis.

Every couple of months I conduct a DIY OGTT. I eat a frozen entree (Southern Belle Lobster Mac & Cheese) and measure my pre and postprandial BG at 0, 30, 60, 120, and 720 minutes. I have been a bit disappointed at how slowly this has improved over the past 6 months. It may only take a few weeks under low stimulation to reverse the markers of metabolic derangement. But It appears that it will take years to truly repair it. And I’m only mildly deranged…

(DenieG) #9

Hi Jennibc.
I used the Libra freestyle continuous monitoring device for about 6 weeks at my Keto Drs advice it was very informative but expensive. I had been doing Keto for about 3 months and was about 30lbs heavier than I am now.
It was both encouraging and informative. Everybody is different the monitoring was a breeze and it gave me some insights into my bodies responses to what spiked and what maintained my BGL’s.
I found the monitor read my sugars at least 2+–5 points higher than my finger prick tests at times but generally read higher. Overall it still gave me much better insights on what and how to eat so as to keep a more consistent level reading.
Another thing was the device I used to read and monitor results!
I used my iPhone & iPad to read the results as the Libra app recommended by the manufacturer and this always read higher as I said. But when I used a different app on my husbands HTC Phone it was extremely accurate and correlated well with the blood monitoring from my blood glucose monitor.
I think it’s worth the investment for a 2-4 weeks trial and then you will get a better idea of the overall way your body responds to carbs you ingest that you track yourself.
Mind you I cooked and calculated every carb I eat that way I knew pretty much what to expect.
I live in Australia so my blood glucose readings are read differently to the USA for example if my reading is 6.0 here in Australia it’s 108 in USA. So every 1 point is actually 18 points for the US. So I hope that explains.
In the meantime I have had to tweak and change my diet often to continue to loose weight and I’m still working on getting my BSL’s down to prediabetic ranges. It’s been 9 months of Keto so far for me.

Denie.