You can have prediabetes for years without symptoms. This means you likely won't know you have prediabetes until serious health problems show up. Talk to your doctor about getting your blood sugar tested if you have any of the risk factors for prediabetes, including: Being overweight.
Not everyone with prediabetes will go on to develop diabetes. Over the short term (three to five years), about 25% of people with prediabetes develop full-blown diabetes.
Without taking action, many people with prediabetes could develop type 2 diabetes within 5 years. With numbers like that, it's important to learn about prediabetes and take action.
Fasting blood sugar test
Less than 100 mg/dL (5.6 mmol/L ) is normal. 100 to 125 mg/dL (5.6 to 6.9 mmol/L ) is diagnosed as prediabetes. 126 mg/dL (7.0 mmol/L ) or higher on two separate tests is diagnosed as diabetes.
Even Really Healthy People Are Prone to Diabetes: Here's What You Should Know. We often assume that just because a person is skinny, they're in perfect health. However, even healthy people can develop insulin resistance, a condition that leads to high blood sugar or diabetes.
Physicians can use a few different ways to test for prediabetes, including the A1C test, fasting plasma glucose (FPG) test or oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT). A1C results of 5.7 to 6.4 percent, FPG levels of 100 to 125, or OGTT levels of 140 to 199 indicate prediabetes.
Prediabetes can progress to diabetes within a year, but it is also reversible. If you have risk factors for prediabetes and diabetes, talk to a healthcare provider about getting your A1C levels checked.
The exact cause of prediabetes is unknown. But family history and genetics appear to play an important role. What is clear is that people with prediabetes don't process sugar (glucose) properly anymore. Most of the glucose in your body comes from the food you eat.
Prediabetes is a health condition in which you have higher blood sugar levels than normal but not high enough to be considered diabetes. People with prediabetes have up to a 50% chance of developing diabetes over the next five to 10 years.
Losing weight and reversing prediabetes can take anywhere from a few weeks, to a few months, to a few years, but the window of time to reverse prediabetes after a diagnosis is between 2-6 years – so you have time!
The good news is that prediabetes can be seen as a warning sign—it's the body's way of saying that your insulin levels are rising, but you can still reverse it before developing type 2 diabetes. And reversing the process is key because type 2 diabetes can be a devastating disease.
Pre-diabetes is a classic case of an artificial diagnosis, a form of disease-mongering that is often now called “overdiagnosis”.
It's common. And most importantly, it's reversible. You can prevent or delay prediabetes from turning into type 2 diabetes with simple, proven lifestyle changes.
However, high cortisol levels caused by stress can impact your blood sugar, weight and eating habits. In other words, stress is one of many factors that can contribute to insulin resistance (prediabetes) and diabetes risk.
You're always hungry.
Because your body doesn't absorb blood sugar efficiently when you have prediabetes, you don't get as much energy from each snack or meal as you once did. "As a result, you tend to feel unusually hungry and want to eat more," Dr. Li says.
According to an ADA expert panel, up to 70% of individuals with prediabetes will eventually develop diabetes.
Risk factors for prediabetes
Sometimes the symptoms of prediabetes can go away if you take better care of your health, but they can come back if you fall back into an unhealthy lifestyle. It's important to be aware of prediabetes, especially if you're over 45 years of age.
In prediabetes blood sugar is slightly high, but not high enough to meet the definition of diabetes. For healthy people, blood sugar testing is typically recommended every three years or so; if prediabetes is diagnosed, repeat testing is recommended more often, at least yearly.
If your body has difficulty metabolizing glucose, it can lead to high blood sugar levels. This can affect your body's ability to heal wounds.
While there are many diet recommendations out there, one of the simplest ways to lower your risk of developing type 2 diabetes and reversing prediabetes is by simply cutting out added sugar. This does not mean cutting out fruit, vegetables, or dairy that have natural sugars.
While lifestyle changes can work wonders, some people with prediabetes also need medication. Your doctor may prescribe metformin if you have certain risk factors, such as low levels of HDL ("good") cholesterol, high triglycerides (a type of blood fat), a parent or sibling with diabetes, or are overweight.
If you have prediabetes, sugar begins to build up in the bloodstream rather than fuel the cells. This is when insulin resistance occurs, which is believed to be the No. 1 cause of prediabetes. A healthy weight allows insulin to work more efficiently and can help to keep blood sugars within a normal range.
Fatigue in prediabetes is common and occurs for a number of reasons. High and low blood sugars can cause tiredness so it is important to check your sugars when feeling like this to try and get a clearer picture of the cause.
Your safest choices will be those that stay away from high-carb and high-sugar ingredients. Stick to dry and light wines, light beers, spirits mixed with sparkling water or fresh citrus, or hard seltzers. Stay away from high-calorie heavy beers, dessert wines, and fruity and sugary mixed drinks or cocktails.
New research has revealed that having a preference for evening activities, going to bed late, and not getting enough sleep may lead to weight gain among people with prediabetes.