Dear Mr Fonorow,
I'm a 74 yr old male caucasian.
I'm controlling T2 Diabetes with diet and exercise. I am successful at maintaining fasting BG at 83 mg/dl and under 100 mg/dl after meals.
I just began using the Dr Pauling's protocol for heart disease because I have angina. It works for me, and very quickly - no pain after 3 days on the protocol - bowel tolerance levels of Vit C.- 10gms/day, 6gms Lysine, 1gm Proline.
On the morning of 8/25/2015 my FG read 93 mg/dl after 3 days using the Pauling Therapy.
I carried out your recommended "experiment" on the meter to check if it read Vit C as glucose. (1gm Ascorbic Acid dissolved in 1 quart water).
The reading was 173 gm/dl.
Q. Can I conclude that my meter is reading my blood glucose at 11% higher because of the Ascorbic acid and if so use that fact to interpret my actual glucose response to be 83 gm/dl.
If that is the case can I reduce all my readings by 11% on the TRUEtest meter to monitor my glucose levels?
I could not find any recent references to this issue in the forum.
Thank You
You mention TRUEtest, please confirm exactly what glucose meter you are using. (If this meter is so accurate that you reliably get 83 mg/dl every day, then I want to start using your meter! The Abbott Labs FreeStyle Lite meter I am using is varies by 5 to 10 mg/dl)
Controlling angina after only 3 days is 7 days ahead of schedule. Congrats. ( I am all ears how your are controlling your blood sugar so well. Please share).
As a review, here is what we think we know:
Your kidneys regulate the blood concentration of vitamin C to a steady state maximum of 1.5 mg/dl. And the half life of vitamin C in the blood is 30 minutes.
Consider that your normal glucose level is 83 mg/dl, so that even if your steady state blood levels of vitamin C are as high as 2 or 3 mg/dl of vitamin C - it is a small fraction of your glucose, and should not (in theory) interfere, either upon waking (fasting glucose) or several hours after your vitamin C intake.?
You seem to be reporting a 10 mg/dl rise after 3 days. The question is whether this is caused by the vitamin C levels now in your blood, correct? (How much vitamin C, if any, were you supplementing previously?) At a minimum, you want to take your regular glucose measurements before taking the vitamin C, or at least 2 hours after taking your previous dosage.
Since you had great success w/Pauling's protocol, I suspect you are following Dynamic Flow - frequent lower dosages throughout the day - which may maintain a higher steady state than 1.5 mg/dl. If this is the case,
you would have to adjust your glucose readings to account for your "round the clock"high vitamin C intake. (But I honestly don't understand how an extra 1.5 mg/dl in your blood - say 1 mg/dl extra, can account for a 10 mg/dl fasting glucose reading.... hmmmm... Maybe your supposition is correct, and your meter greatly over states ascorbic acid. )
I think the relevant previous posts are
The Bioavailability of Vitamin C
http://www.vitamincfoundation.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=11944
(starting several pages in you will find the graphs of our glucose meter measurements. I would appreciate your comments on our experiments).
The older and original forum post on glucose meters reading ascorbate:
Crude Vitamin C blood measurements with a Glucose meter
http://www.vitamincfoundation.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=10603
As you might notice from our graphs - either the IV or the one-time gulp, the blood glucose meter reading while elevated, quickly returns close to normal after an hour or so.
Please stay in touch. If 93 mg/dl is persistent then something else we don't understand is going on!
Thank you for this report and I look forward to your clarifications.