Hi,
I am new to all this and am on 2nd day of induction.
I take 2 Glucovance in the morning and 2 at night.
I had talked to my Endocronologist about going on Atkins and he agreed with it but asked me to still take the medication.
The first day I didn't take any though, I wanted to see how my blood sugar is, and it stayed between 90-120 all day (inculding fasting and 2 hrs after meal) that was a big surprise to me.
However this morning when I checked it after bkfast (half an hour after), it was close to 300. I did get scare and took my Glucovance. After couple of hours it had gone to 145.
My questions are:

1) what should I do if I take the full dosage and get hypoglycemic (which I used to if I dont get the carbs at proper time) being on the induction phase.

2)Is half and hour after bkfast or lunch really a not good measure? from what I understood , the induction diet is not suppose to raised blood sugar anyway so why wait?

3)Even when my blood sugar is normal, I am getting 'small' traces of ketones. Is that somehow is affecting the accuracy of the blood sugar itself.

I sure would appreciate all of your help and Yes I am getting the Dr. birn....book
thanks

Going cold turkey off meds would not be a great idea, but I would ask him to do a couple things, if it were me.

First of all, a Type II diabetic should NEVER go hypoglycemic. If you do, you are overmedicated period. Don't fall for the "I have to eat to keep my blood sugar up". That is for type I diabetics that have trouble keeping their blood sugar up from too much insulin or not enough carbs. While Type II's have the same symptoms, it's not the same cause.

Better yet, tell the doctor you want to take medicine one time a day because you forget to take medicine at night (ok, lie a little). Ask her/him if you can do 1000mg of Glucaphage XR and 45 mg of Actos instead of the four Glucovance (Glucatrol 5mg, and 1000mg Glucaphage). This would be two pills in the morning and none at night.

Question answered:

1) Change drugs, don't let yourself have to be concerned about that. Insist the doctor get rid of the Glucatrol (or anything that causes the pancreas to produce more insulin).

2) The useful time for testing blood sugar is one hour after meals and two hours after meals. My current regime is before meals (meaning 4 hours after the previous) and at bedtime. Anytime you eat something, it can and usually does cause a rise in blood glucose, this should be kept to a minimum during induction, but you want to be below 120mg/dl before you eat again.

3) Normal blood sugar and ketones isn't dangerous. It's probably from you not taking your meds and going up to 300. Keep that sugar down as much as possible.

On the subject, how is your control now? What was your last HbA1c?

Later,
wsgts