Can anyone explain in layman's terms the "Somogyi Effect" or "Dawn Phenomena"?

Answer 1

this is quite tough to explain in plain layman terms. its more of a headache to doctors than patients actually, even though the patients are the ones who suffer the consequences if his/her doctor doesnt think of the somogyi effect.

there are a few things u need to know first before you can understand the effect.

the normal blood sugar level in controled by insulin in your system, which is the defective part when you have diabetis. however, it is not solely controled by this, but also many other hormones.

a natural body responce, when in any conditions of stress is to increase the amount of sugar in the blood. this is a natural phenomenon, as your body is preparing for more energy to be used. your body takes it as more stress = more work = more energy needed.

so the somogyi effect is when you blood sugar level drops low in the middle of the night, due to too much medication or too little food intake prior to that. the reduced blood sugar level releases stress hormones into the system. the stress hormones act by desensitizing the existing insulin in your system.

this in turn slowly leads to increase blood sugar levels that generally is high when you doctor or yourself checks it in the morning.

when you see a high morning reading, your natural theraphy would be to increase the dosage of medication/insulin for the night time. this is assuming that your control is not good enough and your insulin level has been elevated the whole night through.

so increasing the insulin theraphy would only worsen the condition, as a higher stress level is achieved and a persistent high reading is obtained every morning.

this can only be diagnosed by taking regular blood sugar monitoring i.e in a hospital at a few hourly period interval through out the night. it would help too to have a smart doctor who would actually think what the problem may be instead of just taking things at face value and treating you with whatever that first pops into his head.

:) hope this helps

Answer 2

The Somogyi Effect occurs if a diabetic's BG gets too low during the nigh. In compensation, a lot of glucose is released into the system, which overshoots and leads to a high morning BG.

The Dawn Phenomena (or Effect) occurs naturally for everyone. Near the time a person wakes, there is a release of glucose into the system to prepare you for the day. In some diabetics, this will overshoot lead to a high morning reading.

Both give the same symptom, but from different causes. They are also handled differently.

The Somogyi Effect should be handled with a pre-bedtime snack, preferably high in protein to keep the BG from falling too low over the night.
Dawn Effect requires an adjustment of medication, so there is enough insulin or other hypoglycemic to cover the dawn glucose release.

Answer 3

In "layman's terms":

Somogyi Effect- A low blood sugar that "rebounds" into a high. This happens due to the hormones the body releases in response to a low blood sugar. This term is used mainly to describe when this happens during sleep. This is *generally* more of a common cause of high blood sugar in the am for Type 1 diabetics.

Dawn Phenomena- This is a rise in blood sugar that occurs during early morning hours. The body releases stress hormones, and the liver dumps excess sugar into the bloodstream. This tends to happen more in Type 2 diabetics, who are insulin resistant, although it can happen in Type 1 diabetics as well.

Some researchers think that this is a throwback to the days when people would need a burst of energy/glucose after prolonged fasting in order to get their food for the day. In those days, if you didn't hunt or gather, you didn't eat!

Treatment for either usually starts with changing long-acting insulin doses or diabetes medication. Special snack bars exist to help prevent low blood sugar at night. For people with severe Dawn Phenomen who use insulin, the insulin pump is the best way to deal with this. You can set the pump to deliver more insulin at certain times throughout the night. You can also use the pump for Somogyi Effect, if you need very little insulin during certain times during the night.

Answer 4

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Answer 5

somogyi is when a diabetic takes insulin in the evening and it causeshis glucose to dip down in the midnight .So body releases some hormones to counter balance this and in the morning patient has hyperglycemia. This may be misleading thinking the evening insulin is not working properly and increasing its dose which worsens the problem

Dawn phenomenon- here also rise in blood sugar(4 am to 8 am). The cause is not known.

Answer 6

Dawn Phenomenon - A condition some people with insulin-dependent diabetes experience resulting in a significant rise in their early morning blood glucose values (around 5:00 am), possibly requiring additional insulin to control. The incidence and severity of the dawn phenomenon has been debated since its discovery by Schmidt et al in 1981.

An Italian group has studied 114 subjects with Type I diabetes (none using a pump) on 3 separate occasions to assess their insulin requirements between midnight and morning. The results revealed 89% of the patients had an increased need for insulin during the dawn hours. This increase was only 20%, which was lower than previously reported.

The results were extremely reproducible on different days in the same patient. A more pronounced dawn phenomenon tended to occur in patients who were in poorer control, had a shorter duration of diabetes, had adequate counter-regulatory hormones, and used large amounts of insulin.

Dawn Phenomenon is associated with:
Poor Control
Short duration of diabetes
Adequate counter-regulatory hormones
High insulin needs
Perriello concludes his article with: "The dawn phenomenon is a very frequent event in subjects with Type I diabetes mellitus; its magnitude is lower than initially indicated; it is highly reproducible from day to day; it is influenced by factors such as, duration of diabetes, quality of antecedent glycemic control, state of counter-regulation system to hypoglycemia, and insulin sensitivity."

Answer 7

Somogyi Effect

Answer 8

Somogyi Phenomenon

Answer 9

im not a doctor so i dont take responsibility if this is wrong but in
In diabetes, the occurerence of reactive hyperglycemia following hypoglycemia