Eat to your meter is a phrase used to describe the use of systematic blood glucose testing to inform the dietary choice of appropriate foods and quantities of foods for good diabetes control.
Using the ‘eat to your meter’ system is of particular use to people with type 2 diabetes.
If you are on insulin, the principles of eating to your meter can be applied but you must take care not to increase your risk of hypos.
How to eat to your meter
To get started, you will need:
A blood glucose mete r ( discount for diabetics)
Blood glucose level targets to aim towards
A notebook, desktop app or phone app to record results
Take the following steps:
Also note down any other factor that may affect your blood glucose levels, this could include any activity carried out earlier in the day or after eating or any periods of stress or illness.
Making sense of the results:
The aims of eating to your meter is in identifying the foods or meals that lead to a larger rise in your blood sugar levels after eating and the foods and meals that lead to a smaller rise after eating.
This helps you to tailor your diet towards the foods that help you to meet the guideline blood glucose targets.
If a meal causes a large rise in blood glucose levels at the 2 hour mark, you may wish or need to either remove this meal from your regular diet or look to reduce the size of the portion you had of it.
Note that it is the rise in your sugar levels you are looking for. To find the rise, take your result 2 hours after eating and subtract from this your before meal reading.
Similarly, it is also worth looking at the difference between the result 4 hours after eating and your before meal reading when deciding whether a meal is suitable for you.
An example of eating to your meter
It helps to run through an example to see how eating to your meter can be applied. In the example below, we look at two meals in which we take readings before the meal (A), 2 hour after eating (B) and 4 hours after eating (C).
To assess the best meal for blood glucose levels, we need to look at the columns marked ‘2 hour rise’ and ‘4 hour rise’. In this example, the pork chops and swede mash show the best results as it produces a smaller rise at both the 2 hour and 4 hour mark.
So, in this example, we may want to consider either having egg sandwiches less regularly in our diet or to test again to see if having egg sandwiches with whole grain bread produces better blood sugar readings.
Note: this is just an example and you may find that you have different results to those above. The best way to see how your own body responds is to try it out for yourself.
The simple way to understand blood glucose spikes is this: check your levels before meal and then 2 hours after first bite. If the blood glucose levels are same or close to the pre-meal levels then the food is good to eat. But if there is rise and your blood glucose levels are 3 points (US – 30 points) or more higher than the premeal levels, then that is considered as spike in blood glucose. That food should be avoided or at least looked at. Find out what could caused the spike and avoided next time.
Prepare for surprises
Be prepared to get some surprising results. It’s not uncommon for people with diabetes to get results that don’t match their expectations.
Take porridge as an example, some people find their sugar levels respond very well to porridge, but other members find, it can lead to a big rise in blood glucose levels. Whilst porridge is widely regarded as being a healthy breakfast, it’s well worth testing to see whether your body copes well with it.(do not always believe to what others say is healthy)
Note #2: when testing foods or meals, it’s often worth re-testing foods at least to build up a fair picture of how it affects your sugar levels as irregular results can sometimes occur for different reasons.
Benefits of eat to your meter
There are a number of benefits to support eating to your meter:
Allows you to tailor your diet, to your own needs.
We’re all individuals and how different foods affect different people can vary substantially. Eating to your meter helps you to test how much different foods and meals affect your own sugar levels.
Effective at reducing high blood glucose levels after meals
As after meal periods can account for around a third of the day, improving your after meal blood glucose results can have a significant effect on lowering your HbA1c.
Reduce unpleasant symptoms of high sugar levels
It stands to reason that by reducing your sugar levels after meals, this will help to reduce the effect of symptoms linked to high sugar levels such as tiredness, hunger, brain fog and increased need to urinate.
Build confidence in your control
As you begin to build a greater understanding of how different foods affect your blood glucose levels and your sugar levels start to improve as a result, this will not only help you feel better but build your confidence in your diabetes control.
Disadvantages of eat to your meter
Testing blood glucose levels is an essential part of eating to your meter so you will need to get used to taking blood tests. Blood glucose testing is not always pain free but it has become easier as technology has improved and most people get used to and comfortable with testing once the first few tests have been done.
In addition, cost can be an issue. If you get blood glucose test strips supplied this may not be an issue. If your doctor is not happy to prescribe test strips or only happy to prescribe limited amounts, you may need to personally buy some of your test strips.
How to deal with blood glucose spikes
The best way to deal with blood glucose spikes is to drink a plenty of water and light exercise. Walking would be one of the best light exercises or if you have, by any chance exercise bike at home, that would be good too.
Understanding blood glucose level ranges can be a key part of diabetes self-management.
This page states ‘normal’ blood sugar level ranges and blood sugar ranges for adults and children with type 1 diabetes, type 2 diabetes and blood sugar ranges to determine people with diabetes.
Because, if a person with diabetes has a glucose meter, test strips, la ncets and is testing, it’s important to know what the blood glucose level means.
Recommended blood glucose level ranges have a degree of interpretation for every individual and you should discuss this with your healthcare team.
In addition, women may be set target blood sugar levels during pregnancy.
As a result, the following ranges are guidelines provided by the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE). Therefore, each individual’s target range should be agreed by their doctor or diabetic consultant.
Recommended target blood glucose level ranges
The NICE recommended target blood glucose level ranges are stated below. For adults with type 1 diabetes, type 2 diabetes and children with type 1 diabetes.
The table provides general guidance. An individual target set by your healthcare team is the one you should aim for.
*The non-diabetic figures are provided for information but are not part of NICE guidelines.
Normal and diabetic blood sugar level ranges
For the majority of healthy individuals, normal blood sugar levels are as follows:
Blood sugar levels in diagnosing diabetes. The following table lays out criteria for diagnoses of diabetes and pre-diabetes.
A blood sample for a random plasma glucose test is taken at any time. This doesn’t require as much planning and is therefore used in the diagnosis of type 1 diabetes when time is of the essence.
• Fasting plasma glucose test
A fasting plasma glucose test is taken after at least eight hours of fasting and is therefore usually taken in the morning.
The NICE guidelines regard a fasting plasma glucose result of 5.5 to 6.9 mmol/l as putting someone at higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes, particularly when accompanied by other risk factors for type 2 diabetes.
An oral glucose tolerance test involves taking a first taking a fasting sample of blood and then taking a very sweet drink containing 75g of glucose.
While you having this drink you need to stay at rest, until a further blood sample is taken after 2 hours.
An HbA1c test does not directly measure the level of blood glucose. Because, each result of the test is encouraged with the aid of how excessive or low your blood glucose ranges have tended to be over a duration of 2 to 3 months.
Consequently, symptoms of diabetes or pre-diabetes are given beneath the following conditions:
Normal: Below 42 mmol/mol (6.0%)
Pre-diabetes: 42 to 47 mmol/mol (6.0 to 6.4%)
Diabetes: 48 mmol/mol (6.5% or over)
It is important that people control their blood glucose levels as well as they can. Because, too high sugar levels for long periods of time increases the risk of diabetes complications developing.
Diabetes complications are health problems which include:
Kidney disease
Nerve damage
Retinal disease
Heart disease
Stroke
This list of problems may look scary. People can make a note that the risk of these problems can be minimised via properly blood glucose level ranges control.
Small improvements in the way of eating can make a big difference if you stay dedicated and maintain those improvements over most days.
I have already mentioned that there are many opinions on checking BS levels regularly. Many of us been told that checking is not necessary for type 2 diabetics . In my opinion, checking BS levels is absolutely necessary if you want to manage type 2 diabetes and send it to remission.
For example. I have been testing 7 times every day for the first two or three months. Before each meal and then two hours after, that was a total of 6 test plus one test in the morning for a fasting blood glucose levels.
Bare in mind that morning fasting blood glucose levels are usually higher and will settle after few months. The reason for them being higher is your liver. Every morning, just before you wake up, your liver will dump stored glucose into your system to get you ready to go. This is also called Dawn Phenomenon.