Diabetes Mellitus And The Variation In Blood Glucose

Diabetes mellitus is an ailment characterized by persistently raised levels of sugar in the blood or blood glucose. There are numerous types of diabetes but we all know the most common amongst them is called the type 1 diabetes and type 2 diabetes.

Throughout metabolism, food is broken down into its basic elements. Carbohydrates are split down into simple sugars, primarily glucose. Glucose is mainly an important source of energy for the body’s cells. To contribute energy to the cells, glucose requires to leave the bloodstream and get inside the cells. This act of getting glucose into the cells is carried out by the pancreas which produces a hormone called insulin. In a normal healthy person without diabetes, the pancreas generates more insulin whenever blood levels of glucose rise like after a meal, and the insulin signals the body’s cells to take in the glucose.

Why Does Fat Increase Blood Glucose?

Although carbohydrate is the nutrient that has the most critical effect on blood glucose levels, fat is not glucose neutral. But only a miniature portion of the triglyceride (fat) molecule, called the glycerol backbone, can be utilized as glucose. This extremely small increase in the glucose pool can’t be the reservoir of high blood glucose readings. Therefore, when fat is not directly raising blood glucose, what is it arranging?

For many years’ scientists assumed that fat was a metabolically inactive substance. Fat on the body was thought dead weight, just another fat people carted around. Well, it sets out that fat has been pretending as the quiet shy guy in the back row, all the while carrying a substantial metabolic blow.

A high-fat meal can elevate the amount of free fatty acids (FFAs) in the blood. Both regularly upgraded levels of FFAs, as witnessed in chronic intake of high fat particularly high saturated fat meals and obesity, are associated with both skeletal muscle and liver insulin endurance. That endurance means that it will take more insulin—either made by the pancreas or from an injection/shot to move the glucose in the bloodstream into the cells.

There is also a piece of evidence that FFAs may produce a direct role in lessening the amount of insulin secreted by the beta cells in the pancreas, although an exam mechanism for this role is unknown. If not aware let me tell you that fat also changes the timing of the rise in blood glucose after a meal.

Unlike carbs, which is digested fairly swiftly, fat takes a long time to move through the gastrointestinal tract. It can get 4 to 6 hours and sometimes even longer for the fat to be completely metabolized. This can be an intricacy for someone taking insulin.

How Insulin Manages The High Fat Meal?

There are many fast-acting insulins that begins to work about 15 minutes after being injected, tops in about 1 hour, and sustains managing for 2 to 4 hours. So the market has drugs like Novolog, Humalog or Apidra which are Fast-acting insulins and are effective in the body for 3 to 4 hours. When individual eats a high-fat meal, the insulin may start working before a notable amount of glucose reaches the blood. But in many of the instances, the insulin has ceased working before the rest of the glucose arrives. When the blood glucose estimates are looked over after 2 hours of eating a high-fat meal and after 5 hours later there is more increased blood glucose levels.

Therefore, it could be concluded that an occasional fatty meal is fine, but eating large quantities, for example, a meal comprising 40 or more grams of fat, particularly if the fat is saturated i.e. seen in animal meats, etc. It can make it more difficult to control blood glucose levels. Moreover, the diabetic individual would also need to alter the amount and timing of the insulin if he eats high-fat meals.

Reference

If you are diabetic and love eating fatty meals, don’t just rely on the medication but meet Dr. Mudit Sabharwal, the best diabetologist in Delhi. He can help you through your insulin intake and work out on dose precision.

Categorised in: Diabetes