I know they've changed a bit in the last couple years and I'd like to have them on reference. I want every 10th of a percent to be meaningful in my progress.
The original mapping of A1c to average blood sugar (now called estimated Average Glucose (eAG)) was a result of the famous DCCT trials. This was most recently updated with a study that actually had people walk around with CGMs (the ADAG study). You can access a good calculator for this most recent conversion formula on the ADA site.
Yikes, how depressing!
@acidrock...
My question, or your result!?
My result! 5.6 = 114 avg :-(
Are you on a quest to more perfectly control glucose homeostasis than the human body without diabetes?
My result of 7.4 = 166 mg/dl average beats yours in level of depressingness. :P
Yours looks just about perfect!
yes, although the 5.6 was the highest for like a year and was right after the marathon and I'd had surgery and not exercised at all at the time of that particular test. I'd hoped to beat it this time but will find out on Wednesday for sure. I've had some colossal screw ups lately so I'm not optimistic.
If it wasn't for that Chinese food, you'd have me beaten. Keep at it and make slow incremental progress. I'm not giving up ever.
Hey man that just gives you more room for improvement!
BTW- Liking the beard.......
That is awesome. I hope I don't give up ever, either!
Sad to say, his calculation sounds the most accurate, compared to my meter results.
I'm not even saying what my last A1C was -- I completely revamped my diet at the end of December and I'm waiting a solid 4 months before I subject myself to another HbA1C test.
I want shiny, fresh, clean and new red blood cells for my first test of 2012. Ha!
Haha thanks everyone! Didn't think this post would get so much feedback.
I hope I live long enough to see A1Cs as low as all yours!!
Isn't "multiply x 18" just to convert mmol/L to mg/dl? I've never heard it in reference to A1c (aside from people who think mmol/L is the same as A1c because they both cover a similar range).
Jenny Rhul has an A1c and Average Blood Glucose converter on her site, here.
The conversion factor for mmol/L and mg/dl is 18.02.
The formula for A1c and the Average Blood Glucose (ABG) conversion is:
ABG in mmol/L = 1.533 x A1c - 2.52
This is the 2007 ADAG formula derived from CGMs data.
Ha, no problem. I do like the average it comes out with better! :)
Every tenth of a percent is meaningful. Bernstein gives a rule of thumb, every 1% reduction in A1c reflects a drop in average blood sugar of 40 mg/dl. Thus every tenth of a percent is 4 mg/dl. That is meaningful.
I hope you don't compare yourself to others, this is your personal journey. Every step forward means something and we hope to celebrate those with you. But we sometimes take a step forward, only to take another backward. But over time, with persistence, we will continue to move forward and it will make a difference as those forward steps add up.
I compare myself to people w/ pancreases!
I'm thinking that the A1C is measured in mmol. Here in Canada we only use the metric system and mmol is how we measure our blood sugar. Much easier to undstand 7.2 to 4.2 mmol is the "good" range.
I think there's enough variations in A1C tests that such a calculation borders on meaningless.
My first ever endo (pediatric) always had my blood drawn in the same lab because he'd seen inconsistencies from one to another. My previous endo did the test in his office using a fingerstick and some noisy machine that gave a result in 15 minutes; then he also had it measured at a lab with my other bloodwork.
Overall, I think the fingerstick A1Cs give a result that is about .2 or .3 lower than the lab results. I can't really comment on the deviations from one lab to the next (or even multiple tests on the same blood sample at the same lab), but I belive there's enough variation in A1C measurements that you can't go with a strict mathematical equation that maps A1C to average BG. But the best thing, I believe, is to have A1Cs tested from the same place so you can chart progress over time.