Extreme heat

Can this extreme heat we are experiencing at the moment cause my blood sugars to drop regularly. I seem to be going low quite a lot throughout the day. I am obviously sweating a lot so i assume that this is the reason my levels keep dropping. Any help would be great.

I am having the same issue, my BGs are under tight control so run quite low normally but they are dropping even more now...can only assume its the heat causing it!

I've never been sure about the claim that heat affects your levels directly since being told on the first day of my DAFNE course that it doesn't.

I haven't noticed anything like that and I've been boiling... Perhaps you're exercising more than you realise? Being low a lot generally suggests a dose needs dropping somewhere too.

Take care y'all.

The extreme heat makes your insulin more effective so will result in more hypos/lows. The same way that if you load yourself full of insulin and soon after hop into a hot shower you are more prone to lows. The same is true of extreme cold. I was told from an early age that this happened but I had noticed the same tendency with the cold so queried it at the DAFNE course and was told that extremes of temperature, both hot and cold, will cause lower blood sugars (it was in the HCPs course ringbinder - they looked it up). The drop in the cold I was putting down to alot more energy being used to just keep yourself warm.

Evening all. The heat is seriously affecting my blood glucose levels. I am having the opposite to everyone else, my readings are averaging 15-17. I usually wake up with a reading of 6 or 7 and now its 15-17. At bedtime I am usually 7-9 and now it's 17. I am taking more insulin also. I usually have 8 units fast acting at breakfast. and after breakfast it goes up to about 9-10 then starts dropping back to 8-9. then before lunch I inject 8 -10 units and late afternoon I am about 7-9. I usually inject 6 -12 units at evening before dinner and at bedtime I am usually about 7-8. Now I am injecting almost twice as much as normal to try and keep my sugars lower. Also before bed last night I had an extra 6 units of fast acting which would normally bring me into a hypo, but I remained at 15 before bed and 15.2 when I woke up. This is NOT Normal!!! Now its either the weather or the insulin we are all using does NOT work so well in extreme temperatures. It could be one of both of these things. I would suggest trying to cool the insulin down where possible, but not always feasible in work hours etc... Diabetes UK sent out an info update last week about the insulin causing hypos or highs during hot weather. It could be we may have to work on "Sick Day" rules but if DAFNE don't know then we are stuffed!!

Like Jacqueline, my levels have been all over the shop during the hot spell, but mainly on the high side (9 - 11). Because of this I have usually had to correct at bedtime when I take my BI, but the last couple of nights I've managed to engineer a target reading at bedtime and have done a couple of overnight tests, which seem to suggest that my BI isn't affected. Also, I normally use a 2 - 3 correction ratio (i.e. 2 units of Novorapid to reduce levels by 3), but this seems too much in the hot weather, which has led to a few hypos when correcting. Having said all that, I'm loving the hot weather!

Stew