Diabetes Information and Treatment Guide | Diabetes during Pregnancy

Diabetes during Pregnancy - Information and Diagnosis

04.15.2008 by Dr John Anne in Diabetes Information

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During pregnancy, various hormones block the usual action of insulin. This helps to make sure your growing baby gets enough glucose. Your body needs to produce more insulin to cope with these changes. Gestational diabetes develops when your body can’t meet the extra insulin demands of the pregnancy.

Gestational diabetes usually begins in the second half of pregnancy, and goes away after the baby is born. If it doesn’t go away after the baby is born, it’s possible that you already had diabetes and that it was picked up during your pregnancy. The other forms of diabetes, called type 1 and type 2 diabetes, are life-long conditions.

In most cases, pregnancy diabetes has no external symptoms and is detected through screening. Only rarely do the classic symptoms of diabetes appear, eg excessive thirst, frequent urination and tiredness.

Many health-care practitioners recommend that women get their blood screened for high levels of glucose, usually around the 24th week of pregnancy. Called a Screening Glucose Challenge Test, the test involves drinking a sugary solution, then having blood drawn and tested for the levels of sugar that remain in the blood.

A normal reading should be less than 140 milligrams per deciliter and means you probably don’t have gestational diabetes. If it’s over 200 mg/dl, you probably do have gestational diabetes, and your doctor will work closely with you on your diet and exercise and possibly prescribe insulin if needed to control your glucose. If your glucose level is more than140 mg/dl, but less than 200mg/dl, the diagnosis is a little less clear. In that case, your doctor will usually ask you to take another test called a glucose tolerance test (GTT).
Diabetic women are vulnerable to protein malnutrition during gestation. A diet that supplies the needs of pregnancy without including excessive weight gain based on individual’s body weight and structure. Exercise benefits both the mother and the baby. It is neccesry for the over weight women to loose weight.

When the women with pre-pregnancy diabetes reports with an unplanned pregnancy, the first task to achieve euglycemia with insulin plus diet and exercise. During the first trimester, fluctuation in glucose level occurs frequently. Consequently, overnight hypoglycemia may develop.

Pregnant women with diabetes need to carefully monitor eye care, including a full retinal examination before, during and after pregnancy, as diabetic retinopathy (damage to the retina’s blood vessels) can worsen during pregnancy. This complication occurs particularly in women who have poor blood glucose (sugar) control.

During pregnancy, women should measure their blood glucose several times daily: before and after meals, at bedtime, and at night if there is a concern about nighttime hypoglycemia (low blood sugar). The American Diabetes Association recommends pre-meal glucose measurements of 80 to 110 mg/dL (milligrams per deciliter) and post-meal glucose measurements below 155 mg/dL.

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