Rethinking 'Normal' Blood Sugar Levels: New Insights from Recent Research

A recent study by Stanford University researchers reveals that everyday foods can trigger blood sugar spikes even in healthy individuals. Monitoring these fluctuations closely could help prevent diabetes and its related complications.

Blood sugar, or glucose, is the primary energy source in your blood, derived from your diet, and transported to cells throughout your body. Diabetes is characterized by elevated blood glucose levels, which, if uncontrolled, can lead to serious health issues.

Even without a diabetes diagnosis, fluctuations in blood sugar—either too high or too low—can occur. Maintaining consistent eating habits, physical activity, and medication schedules aids in managing these changes. For diabetics, it’s vital to keep blood glucose within target ranges, often monitored through regular blood tests like A1C, reflecting average blood sugar over three months. Elevated levels might require medication and dietary adjustments.

In the U.S., over 30 million individuals have diabetes, accounting for nearly 10% of the population, while another 84 million are prediabetic. Abnormal blood sugar is a key feature of these conditions. Doctors typically test fasting blood sugar or HbA1C to assess control, but these do not reveal daily fluctuations.

To capture these variations, Stanford professor Michael Snyder and his team monitored healthy participants using continuous glucose monitors, which provide real-time data. They examined how blood sugar levels change after meals and compared patterns among individuals.

The study, published in PLOS Biology, identified three distinct groups of blood sugar patterns, called "glucotypes."