Last week, the staff in the nursing home wanted me to take care of an issue regarding a resident who was recently diagnosed with diabetes. I will call this resident “Nola.” Nola was admitted to the nursing home for rehabilitation after she broke her ankle. Nola is 5 foot tall and weighs over 250 pounds. The other residents were complaining because Nola was eating their food despite the fact Nola’s family was bringing in snacks for her. The nurses were monitoring her blood sugar twice a day before she ate breakfast and dinner. Her blood glucose readings were between 94 to 180mg/dl. She was on a diet with limited carbohydrates and was prescribed no blood glucose medications. The trouble was Nola did not believe she had diabetes. Her reaction was pretty normal. However, this was not the real problem. The real problem was the resident convinced her nurse she did not have diabetes. As a result the nurse called the doctor and discontinued Nola’s blood sugar monitoring. You could imagine my reaction when I was informed of this information!

I learned an important lesson. I should not assume everyone who works in the healthcare industry is aware of the same information. I expected a newly diagnosed person with diabetes to be unaware of criteria for diabetes, but a licensed nurse? I have noticed since working with an endocrinologist how little the general medical community knows about diabetes. I tell these stories to the doctor and he just shakes his head in disbelief. This is why I started this website. I want people who actually have diabetes to learn as much as possible about their condition so they can be in control of their care. Fortunately there is a positive outcome from this situation. I persuaded the Director of Nursing for that facility to let me conduct a diabetes training workshop with nurses. It will even include exams. If one resident can avoid dialysis, amputation or blindness than the extra time I spend training these nurses will be worth it. In this blog, I provided a table for the criteria for diabetes so you can learn part of the same information. The information is based on the American Diabetes Association (ADA) and the American Academy of Endocrinologists (AACE) guidelines. Please email me at askard@stablebloodsugar.com if you have any questions about the table and take care of yourself. Allison


Glucose Criteria for Diabetes

Category

Fasting plasma glucose (pre-prandial)

Healthy Blood Sugar <100

Pre-Diabetes (Formerly Called “Borderline” 101-125

Diabetes 126 and higher

Post-prandial(2-hr after eating)

Healthy Blood Sugar <140

Pre-Diabetes (Formerly Called “Borderline
(post-prandial) 140-199

Diabetes over 200 in 2 tests or random glucose of 200