What is Hypoglycemia?
Types of Hypoglycemia
There are many terms used to describe the types of hypoglycemia. Reactive hypoglycemia and fasting hypoglycemia are the two main types of the disorder, with reactive hypoglycemia being the most common.
Reactive Hypoglycemia
Fasting hypoglycemia
Diagnosis
Reactive Hypoglycemia
By far the most common cases of hypoglycemia are types of Reactive Hypoglycemia. Reactive hypoglycemia is also called postprandial hypoglycemia, postprandial syndrome, or functional hypoglycemia and symptoms appear two to five hours after you eat. Postprandial, by the way, simply means, "after eating."
When you eat, your body extracts the sugar from your food-sugar is the fuel your body uses to run. Your body works best with constant fuel supply, so your pancreas delivers insulin to trigger the even, steady release of sugar from your cells. When this works well, the timely release of insulin keeps your blood sugar at a fairly even level.
In some cases of reactive hypoglycemia, your cells do not respond to the insulin right away, so your pancreas releases even more insulin. This means that when your cells finally respond to the insulin, your blood sugar drops more than it should-low blood sugar. In other cases, eating raises the blood sugar so quickly that the pancreas overreacts, causing the blood sugar to drop lower and faster than it should.
Most people who suffer from hypoglycemia have reactive hypoglycemia and the cause is rarely found (idiopathic reactive hypoglycemia).