“Post-meal blood sugars of 140 mg/dl [milligrams per deciliter] and higher, and fasting blood sugars over 100 mg/dl [can] cause permanent organ damage and cause diabetes to progress,” Ruhl writes.
Blood Sugar Levels – An Overview
A blood sugar level of 180 to 250 mg/dL is high. Low blood sugar is when it is less than 70 mg/dl. Blood sugar levels over 250 mg/dL or below 50 mg/dL are hazardous and call immediate medical attention.
Over time, high blood glucose levels can damage the body's organs. Possible long-term effects include damage to large (macrovascular) and small (microvascular) blood vessels, which can lead to heart attack, stroke, and problems with the kidneys, eyes, gums, feet and nerves.
Long-term problems from high blood sugar
High blood sugar over a long period of time, such as months or years, causes damage to body organs. This damage is not usually seen for 10 years or longer.
5 Blood vessel damage can start at A1C levels above 7%. The risk of complications significantly increases at A1Cs above 9%.
A normal A1C level is below 5.7%, a level of 5.7% to 6.4% indicates prediabetes, and a level of 6.5% or more indicates diabetes. Within the 5.7% to 6.4% prediabetes range, the higher your A1C, the greater your risk is for developing type 2 diabetes.
Recent guidelines recommend considering use of metformin in patients with prediabetes (fasting plasma glucose 100-125 mg/dL, 2-hr post-load glucose 140-199 mg/dL, or A1C 5.7-6.4%), especially in those who are <60 years old, have a BMI >35 kg/m2, or have a history of gestational diabetes.
If your blood sugar level is slightly high for a short time, emergency treatment won't be necessary. But if it continues to rise you may need to act fast to avoid developing diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA). If your blood sugar level is 15 mmol/l or more, you should check your blood or urine for ketones.
In general: Below 5.7% is normal. Between 5.7% and 6.4% is diagnosed as prediabetes. 6.5% or higher on two separate tests indicates diabetes.
Managing diabetic neuropathy. Nerve damage from diabetes can't be reversed. This is because the body can't naturally repair nerve tissues that have been damaged.
Over time, the surge and crash of dissolved glucose and insulin that occurs in diabetes can end up causing irreparable damage to many body organs and systems. Doctors refer to this as "end-organ damage" because it can effect nearly every organ system in the body: Hypertension (High Blood Pressure) and Heart Disease.
HEART + BLOOD VESSELS
These face the biggest threat from diabetes. It can be deadly. Diabetes affects your heart and your whole circulation.
Type 2 diabetes affects many major organs, including your heart, blood vessels, nerves, eyes and kidneys. Also, factors that increase the risk of diabetes are risk factors for other serious chronic diseases.
A diabetic coma could happen when your blood sugar gets too high -- 600 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL) or more -- causing you to become very dehydrated. It usually affects people with type 2 diabetes that isn't well-controlled. It's common among those who are elderly, chronically ill, and disabled.
Target blood sugar levels differ for everyone, but generally speaking: if you monitor yourself at home – a normal target is 4-7mmol/l before eating and under 8.5-9mmol/l two hours after a meal.
Michael Patrick Buonocore (USA) (b. 19 May 2001), survived a blood sugar level of 147.6 mmol/L (2,656 mg/dl) when admitted to the Pocono Emergency Room in East Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, USA, on 23 March 2008.
The dawn phenomenon is an early-morning rise in blood sugar, also called blood glucose, in people with diabetes. The dawn phenomenon leads to high levels of blood sugar, a condition called hyperglycemia. It usually happens between 4 a.m. and 8 a.m.
What Is Prediabetes? Prediabetes is a serious health condition where blood sugar levels are higher than normal, but not high enough yet to be diagnosed as type 2 diabetes. Approximately 96 million American adults—more than 1 in 3—have prediabetes. Of those with prediabetes, more than 80% don't know they have it.
Barley or jau water is high in insoluble fibre, which makes it good for diabetics. It is recommended for diabetics as it helps stabilise blood glucose levels. Make sure you drink unsweetened barley water to get effective results. The antioxidant properties of barley water also helps keep many diseases at bay.
If your blood sugar levels are consistently high (usually above 20 mmol/L in adults and above 14 mmol/L in children), you may have moderate to severe symptoms of high blood sugar.
Exercise is a fast and effective way to lower your blood sugar levels. Exercise can lower your blood sugar for 24 hours or more after you've finished. This is because it makes your body more sensitive to insulin. Physical activity causes the body to demand glucose for energy.
So people reduce their carb intake, go on a low carbohydrate diet, and focus on eating healthy fats and (in many cases) too much protein. But what this solution crucially fails to address is insulin resistance, which is the true cause of those high blood glucose numbers.
We suggest initiating metformin at the time of diabetes diagnosis (Grade 2C), along with consultation for lifestyle intervention.
Metformin does not help patients who have insulin-dependent or type 1 diabetes because they cannot produce insulin from their pancreas gland. Their blood glucose is best controlled by insulin injections. This medicine is available only with your doctor's prescription.