This blog tracks updates to the Blood Sugar 101 Web site.


Wednesday, October 5, 2011

New Study Confirms that Post-Meal Sugars and A1c Predict Heart Disease & Mortality

Page changed: A1c and High Post-Meal Blood Sugars Predict Heart Attack

Moved discussion about cholesterol as a predictor of heart attack to the bottom of the page and edited it.

Added the following:

Post-Meal Blood Sugar and A1c Predict Cardiovascular Events and Deaths

A study conducted in Italy which analyzed 14 years of blood sugar data taken from people recently diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes concluded "A1C and blood glucose 2 h after lunch but not FBG [fasting blood glucose] predict cardiovascular events and all-cause mortality." The reason only sugars after lunch were cited here is that the study did not analyze post-dinner readings, only pre-dinner readings. The methodology of this study was crude--basically they compared people who met the anemic ADA blood sugar targets with those who didn't, classifying those with post-meal readings under 180 mg/dl (10 mmol/L) as "good" and comparing them with those that were over and hence "bad." Even with this crude filter, the post-meal reading was predictive.

Postprandial Blood Glucose Predicts Cardiovascular Events and All-Cause Mortality in Type 2 Diabetes in a 14-Year Follow-Up Lessons from the San Luigi Gonzaga Diabetes StudyFranco Cavalot et al. Diabetes Care October 2011 vol. 34 no. 10 2237-2243.doi: 10.2337/dc10-2414

2 comments:

RLL said...

One study you cited said that heart attack risks (deaths?) doubled with each 1% increase in A1Cs. Do you know if that figure is holding up, I thought I saw another study with numbers in the same direction, but not that big a difference.

Jenny said...

There are three studies linked on the main Blood Sugar 101 site HERE.

The magnitude varies from study to study, but the straightline correlation and the strong link between A1c and heart attack does not. That might well reflect the A1c lab standard changes that have taken place over the past decade. A1cs didn't use to be standardized and would differ from lab to lab. Now they are standardized.