3.2.0.0 Def­i­ni­tion of Glu­cose Ab­nor­mal­i­ties

Hy­per­glycemia in hos­pi­talized pa­tients is defined as blood glu­cose lev­els >140 mg/dL (7.8 mmol/‍L) (2,20). Blood glu­cose lev­els that are per­sis­tently above this level may re­quire al­ter­ations in diet or a change in med­i­ca­tions that cause hy­per­glycemia. An ad­mis­sion A1C value ≥6.5% (48 mmol/‍mol) sug­gests that di­a­betes pre­ced­ed hos­pi­talization (see Sec­tion 2 “Clas­sification and Di­ag­no­sis of Di­a­betes”) (2,20). Level 1 hy­po­glycemia in hos­pi­talized pa­tients is defined as a mea­sur­able glu­cose con­cen­tra­tion <70 mg/dL (3.9 mmol/‍L) but ≥54 mg/dL (3.0 mmol/‍L). Level 2 hy­po­glycemia (defined as a blood glu­cose con­cen­tra­tion <54 mg/dL [3.0 mmol/‍L]) is the thresh­old at which neu­ro­gly­copenic symp­toms begin to occur and re­quires im­me­di­ate ac­tion to re­solve the hy­po­glycemic event. Last­ly, level 3 hy­po­glycemia is defined as a se­vere event char­ac­ter­ized by al­tered men­tal and/‍or phys­i­cal func­tion­ing that re­quires as­sis­tance from an­oth­er per­son for re­cov­ery. See Table 15.1 for lev­els of hy­po­glycemia (21). Hy­po­glycemia is dis­cussed more fully below.

Table 15.1—Lev­els of hy­po­glycemia (21)