Managing your blood sugar levels

Discover some of the reasons blood glucose control can be challenging for people with diabetes.

Once diagnosed with diabetes, your health care team will review your "target" blood sugar levels with you. You will likely be told to start checking your blood sugars at home using a meter. Normal blood sugar levels (i.e., people who have not been diagnosed with diabetes) are usually between 4.0 mmol/L and 8.0 mmol/L.

Learn more about how to test your blood glucose levels at home.

To check your blood sugar levels at home, you will need a blood glucose meter, which you can get in most pharmacies. Blood glucose meters are often available for free, but the test strips that go with the meters must usually be purchased.

For a person with diabetes, high blood sugar (or hyperglycemia) is a fact of life. People with diabetes need to spend effort trying to reduce their blood sugar reading so that it is within their target levels. If they don't, blood sugars can get dangerously high, leading to a number of problems.

Low blood sugar is called hypoglycemia (hypo is from the Greek for "low"). Occasionally, your blood sugar level may drop to a level where you don't have enough sugar in your blood to adequately fuel the body's normal functions. Organs in the body that use a high amount of glucose include your brain, heart, kidneys, and muscles.

Description of the test View larger image Diabetes causes uncontrolled high blood glucose (sugar). Monitoring blood glucose every day is an important step to managing blood sugar. Another test used to assess blood sugar control is the hemoglobin A1C test. This test measures how much glycosylated hemoglobin (also called hemoglobin A1C) is in the blood.