Beating a Path to the Door of Type 1 Diabetic Blood Glucose Control

With 93% (95%) of Type 1 diabetics in England (Wales) failing to achieve a HbA1c < 6.5% one would have thought there would have been a great deal of interest in the posts of those Type 1 diabetics who have managed to achieve such control. Examples include Fergus Craig, Dillinger and recently Pneu.

Unfortunately not! Instead what we witness is a steady drip of carping pernicious comment on either the successful Type 1 diabetic or lowcarbing for blood glucose control. Plentiful examples of such behaviour can be found on posts on d.co.uk and ‘Anonymous’ comments on this blog.

The question arises “what blood glucose levels could be achieved under ‘normal’ eating?” Two studies of DAFNE courses in the UK give an indication.

http://care.diabetesjournals.org/content/early/2012/05/20/dc11-1579.abstract

Over a 1 year period average HbA1c fell from 8.51% to 8.24%

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22132868

Over a 7 year period average HbA1c fell from 8.6% to 8.3%

So, even with the provision of a structured education programme, the participants were unable to replicate the success of Fergus, Dillinger and Pneu. Over the past 5 years there have been many other Type 1 diabetics achieving similar success. They were frequent posters on d.co.uk. Where are they now? Gone, worn down by the behaviour exhibited in the posts on d.co.uk and the ‘Anonymous’ comments on this blog. One is reminded of the line from Dylan’s “It’s All Right, Ma”

Cares not to come up any higher

But rather get you down in the hole

That he’s in

John