Diabetes update

[lnr]

Having been on the Wegovy since November I asked my GP to do another HbA1c test, to see how my diabetes is responding to the additional drug and weight loss associated with it. HbA1c is down from 43 in November to 36 on Friday. That's the first time below the pre-diabetic range (42-48) since well before I was diagnosed in November 2020. Now waiting to see what GP wants to do with this information. (Suspect I no longer need to be on a high dose of Metformin though, which is why I wanted them to check).

My iron levels are also still low-end of normal, but it looks like I can now safely give blood again too, so I've booked that in for the Friday after next. We'll have to see how long it takes them to recover from that!

ETA: It's now the 26th and I still haven't actually heard from GP what they think about the results. I asked for an update from the admin team and just got a "result is normal" text, which wasn't very helpful, so have sent the medical team a request to review. Will see what they say!

Comments

[sweh]

Yay for you! Good going.

So confusing that the UK uses mmol/mol to report values, but the US uses %

I think I've been lucky; despite being "obese" according to the charts (BMI of 33) my %A1c (taken last week as part of my yearly checkup) is 5.4 which matches your reading of 36 :-)

[lnr]

Doubly confusing in that the numbers you tend to use for finger prick tests look more like our HbA1c numbers!

Type 2 runs in my family, dad, mum and one of my sisters have all been diagnosed as well as me. So I'm not entirely surprised to have lost that lottery. Not everyone who is obese will be type 2 (and vice versa!) and I'm glad you've won that one!

I think I'm currently still right on the overweight/obese boundary at the moment.

[bugshaw]

That's fantastic!

[lnr]

It is! I'm delighted

[bens_dad]

it looks like I can now safely give blood again

I was going to say that I didn't think they liked your blood if you were on medication; but when I check online that is often not an issue.

I have been turned down in the past, but I may be able to donate again - yeay - though I am going to have to talk further with them.

[lnr]

Diabetes medication is OK so long as it's not changed dose in the last four weeks (and various other rules around Diabetes, which I meet).

Weight loss medication/diets OK so long as you're well, eating over 1000 cals a day, and are not under the weight limit for donation (50kg).

[lnr]

Definitely worth having a chat about eligibility though: rules have changed quite a lot over the last 10 years IME, around all sorts of things as well as medication.

[barakta]

That's such good news. I am so pleased Wegovy is working for you and improving your health in ways which work for you. I hope you can drop the metformin a bit as I hear the side effects of that are not amazing.

[lnr]

I did have some digestive issues when I first started Metformin in 2020, exacerbated a bit when increasing the dose, but they settled down completely. The Wegovy has actually been a bit worse in terms of bouts of diarrhoea - but thankfully always giving me enough notice to reach a bathroom. That's starting to settle down too, as I'm reaching the max dose, but it's been rather more hard work! Worth it though for me.

[shermarama]

Oooh, that is a good number! Glad it's doing useful things. Are you feeling like you have more energy from it?

[lnr]

You'd think if I've got sugar reaching my muscles/organs/etc rather than just sloshing around uselessly in my blood that I would indeed be feeling more energetic, but I suspect this is balanced out by effects of being in a calorie deficit. On balance I'm not feeling like I have any *less* energy than usual though, so that's good.

We're off to the Peak District for a week over the Easter hols, so I'm looking forward to seeing if it's easier going uphill :)