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Recognising latent diabetes

If a woman has suffered from gestational diabetes in a previous pregnancy and she is planning another baby, she can arrange for her doctor to perform a blood screening test for diabetes before she conceives. This will tell her whether she has latent diabetes or not. For a woman who does not have latent diabetes, this test will always be negative.

Tests to screen for diabetes

The only definitive screening and diagnostic test is a blood test. A urine test is very unreliable as a screening tool and is most certainly not diagnostic.

You will hear the term Glucose Tolerance Test or, more often, GTT.

GTT simply involves the person fasting for several hours overnight and taking a measured sugary drink in the morning.

A series of blood samples are taken, normally every thirty minutes for the next two hours. Levels of sugar in each sample are analyzed.

Information from the GTT

There are three possible results: The GTT will tell the doctor whether the mother's body is processing sugars and other carbohydrates efficiently. If this is the case, it will mean she is not diabetic.

It could, on the other hand, show that the control of blood sugars is not optimal - which will be termed "impaired glucose tolerance".

It could show that blood sugar level control has been completely lost. This will mean she has gestational diabetes.

Implications of impaired glucose tolerance

Well, she does not have diabetes, so things are not too bad.

The standard management of impaired glucose tolerance is purely dietary. Her doctors will give her advice on the kind of changes she needs to make in her diet. In most cases, a dietician is involved, to give personalized specialist dietary advice.

Regular blood sugar tests will be done for the remainder of the pregnancy to ensure the status has not changed to gestational diabetes.

Effects of impaired glucose tolerance on the baby

When the diagnosis of impaired glucose tolerance is made, the mother is bound to have a closer follow-up of her pregnancy. Sometimes impaired glucose tolerance progresses into gestational diabetes, which may call for changes in the management strategy.

If impaired glucose tolerance is well controlled, there is no evidence of any adverse effects to the growing fetus in the womb.