Well, this here is an interesting idea. To have caffeine rather than sugar before you exercise when you have type one diabetes? Interesting.
The ADA RSS sent out an abstract on a UK study this morning. Note that there were FIVE people they did the study on. Five. Do you know five people with type one diabetes who will each have the same physiological response to the same event? I don’t. Shoot, I think I’d want there to be thousands of type ones in a study before I’d create a “rule” about exercise and diabetes. But still, this one could be a great idea—I just want more results before I get too excited.
Rather than eat food or adjust insulin before exercise, the study participants simply had this dose of caffeine instead. The 5mg of caffeine (double the daily recommended dose in the United Kingdom; I don’t really have much of a frame of reference for how much that really is for me) stimulates more adrenaline and other hormones, which in turn (as we all know!) raises blood glucose levels. So the need for extra gluose is taken care of “internally” I guess we could say.
I’m curious what the blood glucose levels were a few hours after the exercise. With random hormones running around in my body, it usually takes 2-4 hours before I skyrocket. But then again, that’s usually after I’ve watched someone do minor surgery on me and I’m not exercising, which would assuredly help battle a hormone-related climb.
I wonder if I’ll be curious enough to try this caffeine idea out for myself. Yesterday I lowered my basal way too much for the exercise I planned, and then forgot I had done so and also ate. I ended up checking during my exercise session and being 341. Yeeks. So much for that plan!
I like the thought of being able to exercise without extra the pre-planning. I like that idea a lot. I like the idea of exercise without eating 15-30 minutes before I start. I like that idea a lot too.
So for a little study with a few folks across the world, I’m rather intrigued by this one.
Cool!
