Home
- Eating Well (or at Least Not terribly) at Fast Food Resturants
You can view the current or previous issues of Diabetes Health online, in their entirety, anytime you want.
Click Here To View
See if you qualify for our free healthcare professional magazines. Click here to start your application for Pre-Diabetes Health, Diabetes Health Pharmacist and Diabetes Health Professional.
Latest Diabetes Articles
Popular Diabetes Articles
Highly Recommended Diabetes Articles
Dogs Have Known It All Along: Exhaled Breath Can Identify Low Blood Sugar
It's well known that dogs can somehow sniff low blood sugars. Many people credit their dogs with waking them up when they were dangerously low. How the dogs do it has been a mystery, but now there's evidence that they may be sniffing methyl nitrates on their owners' breath.
From ten children with type 1 diabetes, researchers from U.C. Irvine took a series of breath samples as the children's blood sugar rose progressively from low to high. Then they sent the breath samples to a special lab where, using a method developed to test air pollution, chemists analyzed the children's breath samples for tiny amounts of different gases.
And they found that the children exhaled ten times more methyl nitrates during hypoglycemia than they did when their blood sugar was normal. Better still, the quantity of methyl nitrates correlated nicely with various sugar levels: The lower the blood glucose levels, the more methyl nitrate was exhaled.
The researchers believe that increased levels of fatty acids in the blood during hypoglycemia lead to oxidative stress; methyl nitrates may be a byproduct of that oxidative stress. The scientists are working to develop a whole panel of gases correlated with blood sugar levels, in the hope that eventually breath testing may prove an effective non-invasive way to monitor blood sugar levels. Meanwhile, you can always get a dog.
Source: EurekAlert, September 2007
Categories: Blood Glucose, Blood Sugar, Diabetes, Diabetes, Low Blood Sugar, Pets, Type 1 Issues
You May Also Be Interested In...
Click Here To View Or Post Comments
Nov 18, 2007
-
Diabetes Health
Diabetes Health is the essential resource for people living with diabetes- both newly diagnosed and experienced as well as the professionals who care for them. We provide balanced expert news and information on living healthfully with diabetes. Each issue includes cutting-edge editorial coverage of new products, research, treatment options, and meaningful lifestyle issues.
-
Topics
- Diabetic / Diabetes Health
- Type 1 / 1.5 Diabetes
- Type 2 Diabetes
- Blood Glucose / Sugar
- High/Low Blood Sugar / Fast Acting Glucose
- Insulin- Pumps, Pens & Syringes
- Continuous Glucose Monitors, CGM, Infusion Sets
- Type 2 Medications
- Hyperglycemia
- Hypoglycemia
Email to a Friend
Send a link to this page to your friends and colleagues.