Low Blood Sugar (Hypoglycaemia)

A low blood sugar, also called hypoglycaemia or a "hypo", is where the level of sugar (glucose) in your blood drops too low. It mainly affects people with diabetes, especially if you take insulin. A low blood sugar can be dangerous if it's not treated quickly, but you can usually treat it easily yourself. A low blood sugar causes different symptoms for everybody. You'll learn how it makes you feel if you keep getting it, although your symptoms may change over time. Hypos can also occur while sleeping, which may wake you up during the night or cause headaches, tiredness or damp sheets (from sweat) in the morning. If you have a device to check your blood sugar level, a reading of less than 4 mmol/L is too low and should be treated. Try something like a small glass of non-diet fizzy drink or fruit juice, a small handful of sweets, or [Redirect-302] four or five dextrose tablets. Test your blood sugar after 10 to 15 minutes.



If it's 4 mmol or above and you feel better, move on to step three. If it's still below 4 mmol, treat again with a sugary drink or snack and take another reading in 10 to 15 minutes. Eat a main meal which includes carbohydrate, or have a carbohydrate-containing snack. This could be a slice of toast with spread, a couple of biscuits or a glass of milk. You don't usually need to get medical help once you're feeling better if you only have a few hypos. But tell your diabetes team if you keep having them, or if you stop having symptoms when your blood sugar goes low. Put the person in the recovery position. Don't put anything in their mouth, so they don't choke. Give them an injection of glucagon medicine, if it's available and you know how to do it. If not, call 999 for an ambulance. Wait about 10 minutes if you've given them an injection.



Move on to step four if the person wakes up and starts to feel better. Call 999 for an ambulance if they don't improve within 10 minutes. Give them a sugary drink or snack, followed by a carbohydrate-containing snack. The drinks and snacks used to treat a low blood sugar yourself should work. Tell your diabetes care team if you ever have a severe hypo that caused you to lose consciousness. Stay with them and stop them from hurting themselves. Lie them down on something soft and move them away from anything dangerous (like a road or hot cooker). Give them a sugary snack once the seizure stops. Call 999 for an ambulance if the seizure lasts more than five minutes. Tell your diabetes Glyco Care blood sugar formula team if you ever have a severe hypo that caused you to have a seizure. Sometimes there's no obvious reason why low blood sugar happens.



Very occasionally, it can happen in people who don't have diabetes - see section on low blood sugar without diabetes. If you keep getting low blood sugar, talk to your diabetes Glyco Care ingredients team about things you can do to help prevent it. Low blood sugar is uncommon in people who don't have diabetes. See your GP if you think you keep getting low blood sugar. They can arrange some simple tests to check if your blood sugar level is low and try to find out what's causing it. Having a low blood sugar while driving could be dangerous for you and others. You can usually still drive if you're at risk of low blood sugar. But you'll need to take extra precautions to reduce the chance of this happening while driving. You also need to tell the Driver and Vehicle Agency (DVA) and your car insurance company about your condition. The information on this page has been adapted from original content from the NHS website.