Every practitioner gets a fasting glucose on all their adult patients, looking for type 2 diabetes. Yet this is the single worst parameter to measure, because it’s the last thing to change. Once the fasting glucose rises over 100 mg/dl (signifying glucose intolerance; 126 means diabetes), metabolic syndrome is in full force, and there are no options for prevention anymore; now you’re in full-fledged treatment mode. But in fact, a fasting blood glucose of 90 is already questionable. The same is true for hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c), the blood test that assesses glucose control over the preceding
...more
