Labs and Diagnostics

High blood sugar damages the body years before you feel it. UKPDS found each 1% drop in average A1C tracked with 37% fewer microvascular complications.

Alcohol and blood sugar move in two directions on a night out: up first from carbs, then down for hours. Published sources disagree on how many.

Diabetes rates by state disagree across sources for the same state and year. CDC itself publishes 11.3% crude and 10.1% age-adjusted for 2021. Here's why.

Prediabetes statistics moved this year: CDC's count rose from 97.6 million to 115.2 million US adults. Most pages still cite the older figure.

Severe hypoglycemia isn't a number on a meter. NIDDK defines it as a low you can't treat yourself — and says to call 911 right away after glucagon.

DKA symptoms can appear while a meter reads normal. In FDA-reviewed cases on SGLT2 inhibitors, median glucose was 211 mg/dL, not the classic 250-plus.

Blood sugar 300 is an action threshold, not a diagnostic one. CDC now says check ketones at 250, not the 240 most articles still repeat.

Time in range above 70% is the adult CGM target, but older adults are set at above
50%, and pregnancy uses a lower 63–140 mg/dL band entirely.

Reactive hypoglycemia can't be confirmed by a home meter — accuracy is poorest at exactly the low readings that matter. Here's what a lab draw shows.

The dawn phenomenon is not a rebound from a low. Across 4,705 nights in 2,600 people with type 2 diabetes, fasting glucose ran lower after hypoglycemia.

Medications that raise blood sugar rarely come with a number. Steroids move it in 32.3% of people without diabetes; statins shift A1C 0.06-0.08%.