What is the A1C test?

Once you find out that you have diabetes, you and your doctor will work to keep your sugar readings at proper levels. Main advantages of keeping your blood sugar under control are that you will feel better overall and you may prevent or at least delay as long as possible the start of diabetic complications.

The best way to personally keep track of your blood sugar is to check your sugar level yourself with blood glucose testing meters. This test will tell you what your blood glucose level is at the time you are checking it. The only thing bad about this is that everybody has a sugar level which goes up and down all the time. Especially after you eat. This is where the A1C test comes in.
The A1C test takes a daily average over the past 3 months. This way you and your doctor get a better overall picture of how your diabetic plan is going.

A perfect example of how important this test is just happened to me recently. I have been a diabetic for about 11 years now, I am off insulin now, however I take Actos to smooth out the amount of insulin that my pancreas does still produce. I do cardio exercise for a minimum of 90 minutes per day and I eat a low fat and high protein diet of 2000 calories per day or less. I was checking my sugar 3 times a day right before I ate (to make sure my sugar was not to high to eat something). My sugar level every time I checked it for 11 years was always in an acceptable range. (75-135). My A1C test always came back with flying colors. I had this test 4 times per year. All of a sudden my A1C test came back the last time I went to the doctor very high. My doctor said "how are your finger sticks going?" I said fine. She said well your blood sugar level is averaging about 300 per day. I said "not when I am checking it". She said "well, maybe your sugar is starting to spike after you eat more than usual." So I checked it after I ate and sure enough it was 279.

So, for now anyway I am taking Byetta, which softens the sugar spike after you eat. It also has a tendency to suppress your appetite. Which means with some people, they lose weight. In my case it does suppress my apetite. I have been on it 2 months and my sugar after I eat goes no higher than 127 which I am sure will bring down my A1C test average. I don't know this yet, because I don't go to the doctor until next month. But I check my sugar before and after I eat now and I am sure it will be back to normal. And so far I have lost 8 lbs. Not exactly an astounding amount of weight loss, but the important thing is I did not do anything different to lose this weight. I just found myself eating a little less.

But that just goes to show the importance of the A1C test.