A Brief Information about Blood Sugar and Diabetes Management

This article is a document which gives a brief information about the glycemic index (GI), blood sugar and diabetes management. [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14]

The glycemic index compares the effect of a given amount of food on your blood sugar compared to the same amount of pure glucose. A food with a glycemic index of 28 raises your blood sugar only 28% as much as pure glucose. A food with a GI of 95 behaves like pure glucose. [4]

If you have diabetes, you know all too well that your blood sugar levels rise when you eat carbs. The total amount of carbs you consume in a meal or snack largely determines what your blood sugar will do. But the food itself plays a role, too. A serving of white rice has about the same effect as eating pure table sugar—a rapid, high spike in blood sugar. A serving of lentils has a slower, smaller effect. [4]

The glycemic index (GI) assigns a food a numerical score based on how much it raises your blood sugar. Foods are ranked on a scale of 0 to 100, with pure glucose (sugar) given a value of 100. The lower a food's glycemic index, the slower your blood sugar rises after you eat it. In general, the more processed a food is, the higher its GI, and the more fiber or fat a food has, the lower its GI. [4]

But the glycemic index only tells part of the story. What it doesn’t tell you is how high your blood sugar levels can rise when you actually eat the food. To understand the full impact a food has on your blood sugar, you need to know both how quickly it releases glucose into your bloodstream and how much glucose it can deliver per serving. A separate measure, called the glycemic load, does both, giving you a more accurate picture of a food’s real-life impact on your blood sugar. Watermelon, for example, has a high glycemic index (80). But a serving of watermelon has so few carbs that it only has a glycemic load of 5. [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14].