What Sugar Does to Your Blood

You will doubtless know about the role of blood in your body. It carries oxygen and nutrients to every cell in your body and takes carbon-dioxide and waste byproducts away for disposal.

You will probably also know about the connection between blood sugar and insulin, insulin resistance and diabetes. 

Your pancreas releases insulin into the blood to signal to ‘s role is to prevent blood sugar levels exceeding 

However, as if that wasn’t enough, sugar creates other problems that aren’t widely known.

The red blood cells do the important job of carrying the oxygen to the cells and transporting carbon-dioxide away.

They are about 7 micrometers in diameter and have the shape of a ball that has been partially deflated and had two opposite sides squashed together. They have the same surface area as a ball of the same diameter but, essentially, are much more flexible.

The large surface area is important for efficiently picking up and carrying oxygen and the flexibility is important for getting around the arteries, veins and capillaries that make up your circulatory system.

The smallest tubes in the circulation system are the capillaries and some of these are only 5 micrometers in diameter. This, being narrower the width of the red blood cell, requires it to deform significantly to pass through.

If you have a ball of 10cm diameter and need to get it through a hole that’s 8cm in diameter, it’s not going to fit. However, if you deflate your ball you can fold it and push it through the hole more easily. The surface area of the ball doesn’t change.

Sugar can make your red blood cells sticky and stiff so they resist bending and tend to stick together. This makes it very difficult for them to pass through the small capillaries, reducing blood flow to extremities, starving them of oxygen and nutrients – and increasing the chance of a blockage.

Capillaries are a multitude of tiny branches that carry blood from the arteries to every cell. One small blockage will have a localised effect and may cause the death of a few cells which will quickly be replaced. However if the problem affects a larger area with multiple blockages and happens repeatedly, permanent damage may occur. 

The result can be numbness in the skin, fingers and toes, red blotches on the skin, and degeneration in the eye.

The amount of sugar in the blood for normal metabolism is equivalent to about one teaspoon. Levels above this cause the release of insulin to trigger the storage of the excess sugar as fat and get it out of the circulation.

If your insulin response is compromised (if you are insulin resistant or diabetic), your body is unable to maintain safe sugar levels and your risk of cell damage is greatly increased, possibly affecting organ function, vision and limb health.

Insulin resistance and diabetes is a serious problem for many people but it needn’t be.  There is a simple solution: stop eating sugar and refined carbohydrates.