How long does it take for insulin to improve the sugar level in pregnant women with diabetes?

Question

Hello doctor,

My wife is 5 weeks pregnant. She has type 2 diabetes. Her HbA1C was 6.6% one month ago. She was taking tablet Melmet SR 500 mg twice daily. After confirming pregnancy, we checked her sugar level for fasting and postprandial for three consecutive days, average around 140/165 mg/dL. So as per our diabetologist, she started using Novorapid four units three times a day. She took the insulin four times till now, starting from the day before yesterday, and today, we checked her fasting blood sugar, and it came as 138 mg/dL. My queries are as follows:

1) Does Insulin takes time to improve sugar levels?

2) We heard that diabetes makes an impact on the baby. Will these sugar levels impact our baby?

Kindly help.

Answer 1

Hello,

Welcome to icliniq.com.

Thanks for the query.

Diabetes during pregnancy has to be managed systematically, and a diabetologist cannot handle a pregnant mother. The dosing of Insulin depends on the mother's weight and the multiplication factor for the first trimester. Insulin shows immediate sugar control within 24 hours. But simple blood sugar profile is not recommended for calibrating dosing for pregnant women. It would help if you got an OGTT (oral glucose tolerance test) with 75 g glucose and fasting for 12 hours before the test. Then the requirement of Insulin could be ascertained and calculated for the mother. It is just 5 weeks and early pregnancy; the viability needs to be established by the arrival of heart rate. The chances of missed abortions are high in uncontrolled diabetic mothers. Please follow up with all the reports for evaluation and advice.

Regards.

How long does it take for insulin to improve the sugar level in pregnant women with diabetes?

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