OT: Diabetics, help please.

Liz, I couldn't agree more - Jenny's blog is awesome. She's done extensive research in many areas to save us from having to do ALL the experimenting.

There's also a great read from a long time poster on the ADA forums (who is also a personal friend of Jenny's) titled What on Earth Can I Eat?

Cheers,
xena

xenablue wrote:Liz, I couldn't agree more - Jenny's blog is awesome. She's done extensive research in many areas to save us from having to do ALL the experimenting.

There's also a great read from a long time poster on the ADA forums (who is also a personal friend of Jenny's) titled What on Earth Can I Eat?

Cheers,
xena

I'm not diabetic, but found her site when I started low carb. After exploring there, I sometimes wonder if I know more than my diabetic friends who trust there MD's.
I picked up a meter with strips at walmart for $20. It's interesting what you learn about what you eat and how it effects your body.

Liz, if you've read Jenny's blog, and probably other great info, I have no doubt you know more than most doctors do about diabetes, let alone your friends who do nothing taking control of their diabetes outside of what their doctor/s recommend/s.

For us, our meter is THE single most important tool in taking control.

I applaud you for monitoring your own BG - specially if you have any relatives with T2 - you'll be so far ahead of the game (wish I'd been ).

cheers,
xena

Jenny's blog is based on Dr. Bernstein's Diabetic Solution and I think BOTH are essential reading for you to understand how to "eat to the meter".

I'm a little leery of the ADA, to be honest. They follow the conventional guidelines for diabetic diet managment and will tell you that an A1C of 6.5 is just fine, that you aren't diabetic until your post prandial (after meal) blood sugar is well into the 200's (but Jenny Ruhl points out that studies show organ damage begins when your blood sugar is 140), and tell you that you NEED 6 servings of carbohydrates a day. If you "eat to the meter and your blood glucose rises with those six servings of carbs, then they don't tell you to stop eating the carbs, they tell you to take more medicine. IMHO, the ADA is more harmful than helpful--I think that advice is downright DANGEROUS.

Janknitz wrote:Jenny's blog is based on Dr. Bernstein's Diabetic Solution and I think BOTH are essential reading for you to understand how to "eat to the meter".

I'm a little leery of the ADA, to be honest. They follow the conventional guidelines for diabetic diet managment and will tell you that an A1C of 6.5 is just fine, that you aren't diabetic until your post prandial (after meal) blood sugar is well into the 200's (but Jenny Ruhl points out that studies show organ damage begins when your blood sugar is 140), and tell you that you NEED 6 servings of carbohydrates a day. If you "eat to the meter and your blood glucose rises with those six servings of carbs, then they don't tell you to stop eating the carbs, they tell you to take more medicine. IMHO, the ADA is more harmful than helpful--I think that advice is downright DANGEROUS.

Jan, I trust my Internist MD who is:

1) Chief physician of a local hospital
2) Medical director of a local assisted living facility
3) "Best doctor in America" in Internal Medicine within 100 miles radius of my home (it includes Duke Medical Center). He agrees that this one is a hype.

He does not allow his patients to go above 6.5 on the A1c without taking severe Rx measures. I am at 6.1 to 6.4 and take 10 mg of Actos daily with my BMI of 29. Once I was at 6.7 A1c at my quarterly testing, and my Doc pinched my "tire" on my waists and said "Girl Scouts Cookies Ha!" Soon the Actos would be available "over the counter". I am ready to bet that its price will double to $3 a tablet. Like the Purple Pill did.

I agree with you that most of those nutritionists MDs who are on the Festivals money raising events at my public radio station are extreme in their views with their books and recipes and are for the easy money making in it.

Not sure where you found that information that Actos will be going over the counter (OTC) soon. Given the problems with other products in the class, I think it is highly unlikely that Actos will ever go OTC. Look up liver failure and death with troglitazone, and heart disorders with rosiglitazone. You need a safe product with no history of serious adverse events to get OTC approval by FDA. Look for a generic version long before OTC! Apologies if there already is a generic version.

Janknitz wrote:Jenny's blog is based on Dr. Bernstein's Diabetic Solution and I think BOTH are essential reading for you to understand how to "eat to the meter".

I'm a little leery of the ADA, to be honest. They follow the conventional guidelines for diabetic diet managment and will tell you that an A1C of 6.5 is just fine, that you aren't diabetic until your post prandial (after meal) blood sugar is well into the 200's (but Jenny Ruhl points out that studies show organ damage begins when your blood sugar is 140), and tell you that you NEED 6 servings of carbohydrates a day. If you "eat to the meter and your blood glucose rises with those six servings of carbs, then they don't tell you to stop eating the carbs, they tell you to take more medicine. IMHO, the ADA is more harmful than helpful--I think that advice is downright DANGEROUS.

Jan - I agree with you completely - in fact many of us on the forums knock much of what the ADA touts - the forums are very open and are not governed by the ADA just because they own the site. The T2 forum is very active with many varying opinions, but they mostly comprise self-controlling their T2 and eating to their meters.

If my BG numbers are too high, I correct my eating and do some exercise - whilst I'm not against meds, for ME I'd prefer to change my eating/exercise as the treatment rather than adding more meds. Just MHO of course.

Cheers,
xena

Sorry, but I wouldn't touch Actos with a 10' pole.

Your doctor may be the very best there is - doesn't mean he knows anything about diabetes - it's an individual disease and no doctor can claim to know exactly what will work or not work for you. There is no 'one size fits all'.

My endo is a leading specialist in diabetes - he takes notes from me, he researches, we discuss. He believes that between his medical expertise and my keen interest in my own health and willingness to experiment, log and research means I'm doing the very best for my health - which also includes other issues somewhat related to both OSA and T2.

Cheers,
xena

Part of the problem with the management of diabetes is that many docs do think it is one size fits all. So they will go with pharma product a, then add pharma product b, and so on, until the "only" treatment is to use insulin. It is the same with obesity. The reality is that not everyone IS the same. If you become aware of diabetes early enough, you may be able to reverse it by an appropriate diet and exercise (very tough for people who work in offices, sitting down most of the day, I know!). Other people may need one or more pharma products. The ADA story seems to be that you don't treat diabetes until your A1C reaches their cut-off level; this may be too late for some people. If there was an easier way of measuring blood glucose than the finger stick devices, maybe we could all monitor our BG, exercise more when the level goes up, and actually prevent the development of diabetes. On the other hand, how would that benefit the pharmaceutical industry? A bit like stopping us from adjusting our sleep apnea machines. They actually seem to want us to get really sick, have strokes and other health problems, so that they can sell us more of their products.

Health insurance is great, but as a society we need to try and avoid using it as much as possible so that it remains/becomes affordable for most people. I try and avoid running to the doc for every little cough and sneeze, and am keeping my weight more or less under control (I should lose another 15 lb, but has been that way for quite a while!). Hopefully, if I can do a bit more exercise, and keep using my CPAP every night, I can get to where I would like to be health-wise. My Mum passed away 3 years ago, and I think of the years she struggled with obesity and diabetes. I don't want to go there.

So, while the docs know a lot more than I do about diagnosis of the ills that do come my way, I prefer to concentrate on the healthy approach to diabetes prevention rather than look forward to popping one or more pills several times each day, or injecting insulin one or more times every day.

SleepyToo2 wrote:Not sure where you found that information that Actos will be going over the counter (OTC) soon. Given the problems with other products in the class, I think it is highly unlikely that Actos will ever go OTC. Look up liver failure and death with troglitazone, and heart disorders with rosiglitazone. You need a safe product with no history of serious adverse events to get OTC approval by FDA. Look for a generic version long before OTC! Apologies if there already is a generic version.

I think I ment generic. Let me find out.

See it here:

http://money.usnews.com/money/blogs/the ... neric-soon