Here are some terms and expressions that are useful to know when reading about type 2 diabetes and health in general.
Fasting blood sugar – Your blood sugar after you haven’t eaten anything for 8-12 hours or more.
HbA1c – This is the name of a blood test that measures your long-term blood sugar. A lower value is better. It’s also known as glycated hemoglobin or just A1c. If you have diabetes, you probably measure this regularly at your doctor’s office.
HDL cholesterol – So called “good cholesterol”. Higher levels are considered healthy.
Insulin – A hormone, produced and released by the pancreas, which has many roles in the human body. It is best known for lowering blood sugar.
Insulin resistance – The state when your body doesn’t respond normally to insulin. Insulin resistance is characteristic of prediabetes and type 2 diabetes, and quite common in type 1 diabetes as well. It’s one of the root causes of high blood sugar. When you reduce insulin resistance, your blood sugar control improves.
Insulin sensitivity – A measure of how well your cells respond to insulin. High insulin sensitivity is good.
LDL cholesterol – So called “bad cholesterol”. Higher levels are considered unhealthy.
Meta-analysis – a scientific study that pools the results of multiple other studies to analyze the combined results
Metabolic syndrome – Metabolic syndrome is a diagnosis that someone gets when they have a cluster of abnormalities, such as high blood pressure, large waist circumference, high blood sugar, poor blood fats. It is closely related to type 2 and prediabetes.
Placebo – A useless treatment (e.g. a fake supplement) given to patients under the pretense that it’s an active treatment. Another group is given the real treatment (e.g. real supplement) to see if the real treatment group improves more than the placebo group. This is done in order to find out if a treatment is better than the placebo effect.
Post-meal – The period after eating or drinking something, e.g. post-meal blood sugar.