Elevated blood sugar and PN
 

Have any of you who are diabetic noticed an increase in your PN symptoms when your blood sugar is elevated? Or a decrease when the levels are down?

I got back labs Wednesday showing my glucose at 155 and nearly croaked. Of course, steroids can bring on steroid induced diabetes and weight and inactivity don't exactly help avoid it. Diabetes? Don't know...

Last night, my friend stuck me at dinner... I hate getting my finger stuck and made a whiny scene in the restaurant, but she stuck me anyway, and my sugar was 79. Is there any correlation if your symptoms are not as bad?

Maybe I just need to eat half of an Amaretto cheesecake and see what happens???

Cathie

Cathie, i was classed as prediabetic and before that I used to drink beer on a regular basis, beer is full of sugar of course, and if i blew the throth off a couple
[ had a couple cans] i could guarantee that in about 45 mintues time, my feet would start to burn madly every time, it sure made me give up the beer all together.
Brian :)

Brian:

Does the same thing happen if you eat sugar or a bunch of carbs now? I could not recall what I had eaten before the test was done, but it was probably something like a bunch of tequitas-probably a major carb overload...

Cathie

Yes Cathie the same deal, i noticed it when i had that 99% fat free icecream, whilst it was great for cholesterol it was full of sugar, someone told me that it was the sugar that held it together, but any high sugary carbs used to do it to me, thankfully it doesn't happen these days if i have a very occassional sweet, but i wouldn't push my luck to much.:)

I too have noticed at times--
 

--that if I have eaten something with a lot of simple sugars in it (like Brian, I'm fond of ice cream), I will sometimes (not always) get an uptick in symptoms.

I've talked about this with Drs. Latov and Chin; they've said while there's not much research evidence that indicates those with non-diabetic neuropathy are necessarily affected by hikes in blood sugar, anecdotally a number of people have reported this. Dr. Chin tells me that he advises anybody with small-fiber neuropathy of unknown origin to avoid eating too much sugar AND too much gluten (whether they have tested positive for gluten sensitivity or not); he thinks both can be at least a small-fiber "irritant". (This is usually when I tease him about all the cookies and candy in those Cornell offices.)

I noticed when I ate rice or Pasta
 

I would get the restless leg syndrome within an hour after eating rice or pasta, which is a complex carb... breaks down into sugar...
We used to stop and eat at a great Italian restaurant before driving to my parents house, which was an hour and a half drive. Every time we would get about half way there, my legs would get out of control... I couldn't stand sitting. I would have to start bouncing, shaking, tapping my feet, and couldn't wait to get out of the car. This was before I had PN, and now that I have PN, I never eat rice or pasta before bed. I'm afraid of the pain it will cause.

I have
 

definitely noticed an increase in pain when I have elevated glucose levels. I wasn't sure that the sugar levels were the cause, but there did seem to be a connection.

Yep
 

Both sugar and alcohol will shoot it up and like Brian pain. Now that i
am a diabectic 2,just a little bite of 1 of Bob's girlfriends chessecake
and i hurt,i don't want to think of Alcohol.

My friend thought her husband couldn't get PN from drinking beer,in her
mind she just couldn't put beer or wine with Alcohol. As long as he
only drinks that he will be fine. He has PN from drinking. He was never
a Diabectic or is he now. But in a lot of pain and the dummy yells at her.
:( :( It's sad Sue

blood sugar
 

Steroids do increase blood sugar. That is all I know about it. I can't say that my symptoms ever correlated, as I am not diabetic, I do test my own BS now and then tho. I never had an elevated fasting glucose until I was on IV steroids for 16 weeks, then it was high....after that, it eventually went back to normal.

I do know that some PN has been correlated to abnormal glucose tolerance tests. I have heard that it is good to get a glucose tolerance test if you are diagnosed with PN. I have asked about it, but my docs don't seem to enthusiastic about doing it.

Post prandial blood sugars of 155 are not that unusual or abnormal. The 79, while you were eating, indicates a normal range, and that the food you had eaten had not yet hit your digestive system.

Cyclelops, like the name too :) , but i just wanted to say that when a doc in his surgery tested me for diabetes, nothing showed up, she said " you certainly have got no problems with any diabetes " but in the first and only batch of tests that my neuro done he ordered a Glucose Tolerance test, the results come back as i was prediabetic.
To many docs world wide are still under the impression that you have to have full blown diabetes to get PN, which is not true.

eg -I had a hip replacement not that long ago and you know how an anesthetist will go over all your medical records before an op, well when i told this guy who had a student with him, that i had PN caused through prediabetes, he said " no way you have to full blown diabetes for a long time before you get PN out of it " so i said would you like to phone my neuro and tell him that ? he is Associate professor of neurology Dr.........., at our largest teaching hospitals in our state, i think he is the head of the neuro department & specializes in PN as well, he jaw just dropped and said " i really don't want argue with you.:D :D :D , i said " neither do i, your the doc mate but your very wrong about this " i think i might have brought him down a peg or two in front of his student. :D :D
This does worry me though with the medical profession, i wonder how many PNer's are out there that are classed as Idiopathic, and are suffering needlessly when they could be treated and eventually curred in time.
all the best
Brian :)