How to Diagnose Gestational Diabetes

Gestational diabetes occurs in pregnant women who never before suffered from diabetes. Roughly 5 percent of all pregnant women develop the illness, which can cause extreme complications for mother and baby. Gestational diabetes causes your body to incorrectly manage glucose levels. Most practitioners routinely test for it between 24 and 28 weeks of pregnancy, when the placenta starts making hormones that can cause resistance to insulin.

Instructions

1. Go to your routinely scheduled glucose screening test. You're given a sweet drink containing 50 grams of glucose, which you have to drink within a few minutes. After 1 hour, a technician draws blood from your arm.

2. Receive test results from your practitioner within a few days. If your blood glucose level is more than 140 mg/dL, you must return for a 3-hour, diagnostic test called the glucose tolerance test (GTT). If your level is less than 140, you do not have gestational diabetes at that time.

3. Follow the instructions to prepare for the GTT. You should eat 150 grams of carbohydrates a day for 3 days before the test. Then, you must fast for roughly 12 hours before your test. This means no food or drink and small amounts of water.

4. Arrive for your GTT test. The technician takes a fasting blood sample from your arm shortly after you arrive. Then, you drink a heavily concentrated glucose drink.

5. Prepare yourself for the next 3 hours, when a technician draws blood from your arm every hour to test your glucose levels. If two or more of your blood levels come back too high, your practitioner diagnoses you with gestational diabetes.

6. Work with your practitioner or nutritionist to develop a healthy diet to manage your blood sugar levels, if you're diagnosed with gestational diabetes.

Tips & Warnings

• Schedule your glucose tolerance test first thing in the morning, since you must fast beforehand. Pack food to eat as soon as you complete the GTT.

• Bring something to do while undergoing the GTT. You're at your practitioner's office for 3 plus hours.

• Most pregnant women have no symptoms before diagnosis of gestational diabetes. A small number do feel extreme hunger, thirst or fatigue.

• Often a strict diet and exercise is enough to control the disease; however some pregnant women must measure their blood sugar levels daily or several times a day. Some must receive insulin injections, which are not harmful to your baby.

• In most cases, gestational diabetes goes away soon after pregnancy.

• After your initial screening, if your blood glucose level is above 200 mg/dL your practitioner likely considers you diabetic and won't proceed with the GTT.

• You are extremely likely to develop gestational diabetes again in following pregnancies if you've had it once.

• You are at a higher risk of developing diabetes later in life once you've had gestational diabetes. Some research indicates a 60 to 70 percent chance. Maintain a lower weight, eat well and exercise regularly to avoid recurrence.