What You Need to Know About Achieving and Maintaining a Normal Blood Sugar Range
Diabetics are faced with a challenge that many of us never even need to think about.
That challenge is achieving and maintaining a normal blood sugar range.
If you do not have diabetes your body is generally able to keep the levels of sugar or glucose in your blood at a level where it will not cause any damage to your organs and bodily systems.
However, if you do have Type I or Type II diabetes, your body will be unable to control this itself and so it will take continuous monitoring and testing as well as the use of medications in order to keep it in a normal range.
But what is a normal blood sugar range? This can vary depending on whether you have eaten recently or whether you have been fasting.
If someone has eaten recently, their blood sugar will generally be higher immediately after eating and will slowly begin to get lower as time progresses.
For non-diabetics, the normal blood sugar range is 4-8 mmol/L.
The goal for diabetics is to keep their levels between 4 and 10 mmol/L.
They test their levels at certain points during the day.
This is usually done by pricking the finger and placing a certain amount of blood on a testing strip.
There are many different machines that can analyze the blood and determine how much glucose is present.
A diabetic then knows whether they need to take steps in order to raise or lower the amount of glucose in their bloodstream so that it can be brought back into this normal blood sugar range.
If the levels are elevated a diabetic will take insulin and if these levels are too low, they will need to either eat food or consume a quantity of sugar in order to bring their levels up.
Many people do not realize that either extreme can be equally bad although the symptoms of these extremes are completely different.
Low glucose levels can cause a diabetic to feel confused, tired and dizzy and, if they become extremely low, can lead to a coma or seizures.
Very high levels of blood glucose can cause diabetics to experience many of the unwanted side effects of diabetes that can lead to things such as blindness.
Because everything from illness to diet, pregnancy and age can affect your blood glucose levels it is important to speak with your specialist in order to find specific strategies to keep yours under control.
Methods of doing this include diet, exercise and the use of certain medications.
That challenge is achieving and maintaining a normal blood sugar range.
If you do not have diabetes your body is generally able to keep the levels of sugar or glucose in your blood at a level where it will not cause any damage to your organs and bodily systems.
However, if you do have Type I or Type II diabetes, your body will be unable to control this itself and so it will take continuous monitoring and testing as well as the use of medications in order to keep it in a normal range.
But what is a normal blood sugar range? This can vary depending on whether you have eaten recently or whether you have been fasting.
If someone has eaten recently, their blood sugar will generally be higher immediately after eating and will slowly begin to get lower as time progresses.
For non-diabetics, the normal blood sugar range is 4-8 mmol/L.
The goal for diabetics is to keep their levels between 4 and 10 mmol/L.
They test their levels at certain points during the day.
This is usually done by pricking the finger and placing a certain amount of blood on a testing strip.
There are many different machines that can analyze the blood and determine how much glucose is present.
A diabetic then knows whether they need to take steps in order to raise or lower the amount of glucose in their bloodstream so that it can be brought back into this normal blood sugar range.
If the levels are elevated a diabetic will take insulin and if these levels are too low, they will need to either eat food or consume a quantity of sugar in order to bring their levels up.
Many people do not realize that either extreme can be equally bad although the symptoms of these extremes are completely different.
Low glucose levels can cause a diabetic to feel confused, tired and dizzy and, if they become extremely low, can lead to a coma or seizures.
Very high levels of blood glucose can cause diabetics to experience many of the unwanted side effects of diabetes that can lead to things such as blindness.
Because everything from illness to diet, pregnancy and age can affect your blood glucose levels it is important to speak with your specialist in order to find specific strategies to keep yours under control.
Methods of doing this include diet, exercise and the use of certain medications.
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