"The screening test for gestational diabetes is oral glucose challenge test and here the way it is done is the patient can come nay time to the hospital, irrespective of the last meal, irrespective of the time of the last meal, irrespective of teh type of diet she has taken before, she will be given 75 grams of glucose. After taking 75 grams of glucose, her blood sugars will be tested after 2 hours and the cut off for this is 140 mg per decilitre. Anything above 140 mg per decilitre indicates gestational diabetes. The glucose challenge test is a very simple and easy test to detect gestational diabetes. It is a very simple tests as in the patient need not fast and the pregnant patients if they are kept fasting or a long time they keep on vomiting and the develop gastritis and they are not even able to withstand their hunger and after that if glucose is given they start vomiting. So this is a very patient friendly and one step method to detect gestational diabetes. Before there as a test called as glucose tolerance tests for pregnant patients, wherein the pregnant patients used to take low carbohydrate diet for 3 days, come to the lab on empty stomach, first give their blood for fasting blood sugar, the give 100 grams of glucose and thin the blood as drawn after the first hour, second hour and the third hour and in all these 3 hours they were not supposed to eat and drink this was a very cumbersome and most patient unfriendly tests but this oral glucose challenge test has become a very easy. Patient friendly, easy and reliable method"

"Gestational diabetes is usually screened using a test called as oral glucose challenge test between 6th and the 7th month that is about 24 to 26 weeks and when the patient books with us about 6 to 8 weeks the screening tests would be fasting blood sugars and HbA1c, that is glycosylated haemoglobin. This HbA1c indicates that her blood sugars for the past 3 months. So FBS combined with HbA1c will screen her for overt diabetes , that is if the diabetes was present in her before even she fell pregnant. Any fasting blood sugar below 90 and HbA1c below 6 indicates she was not diabetic before she fell pregnant. When we come to oral glucose challenge test that is done between 6th and the 7 th month that is about 24 to 26 weeks, the upper limit for the cut off is about 140 mg per decilitre. So any level above 140 mg per decilitre, indicates that she is having gestational diabetes"

"Definitely gestational diabetes disappears after delivery, it disappears so fast that suppose if you deliver the baby today, the next day morning the sugars will come to absolutely normal values. Infact this is counselling we do to the patients with gestational diabetes and this is the motivation we do for gestational diabetes that they need to follow exercise, diet and they need to take their medication and insulin everyday. The day after they deliver, they don’t have to follow anything, their sugars will automatically come back to normal. This only proves that pregnancy was the cause for gestational diabetes. In some gestational diabetes that have required insulin or oral hypoglycaemic agents, the day after they have delivered, the requirement of insulin crashes and the need for oral hypoglycaemic agents almost disappears"

"The word dangerous is not an apt term to be used for gestational diabetes because gestational diabetes is one which starts first time in the pregnancy and it doesn’t cause any major abnormalities or chromosomal abnormalities or birth defects in the baby. So if you consider that it is not a very dangerous condition for the fetus. The only two problems mostly that are caused by gestational diabetes that is macrosomia where the weight of the baby is more and polyhydramnios where the liqor around the baby is more. If the gestational diabetes is well controlled, without requiring oral hypoglycaemic agents or insulin, usually the outcome is very good. But even if the gestational diabetes requires insulin or oral hypoglycaemic agents, and the sugars are well under control, even then the outcome is very good the problem arises when the sugars are not under control, even if the dose of the insulin or whether the patient is following proper diet and exercises and the sugars do not come under control then there is a small chances of stillbirth. Stillbirth is a term we use where the baby is suddenly dies, in utero maybe 39 to 40 weeks. This is the only problem, but a rare problem, but generally gestational diabetes are well controlled"

"The medications are given for gestational diabetes are two, one is insulin and the other is oral hypoglycaemic agents that is oral medications. Before insulin was the and stay of treatment for gestational diabetes, there was no other options apart from exercise and diet, we used to give insulin. But now plenty of studies have been conducted and they have proved that there are about 2 to 3 oral hypoglycaemic agents that are used for gestational diabetes. Infact this is a welcome studies for the patient because they can avoid taking injections everyday and the different medications that are available for treating gestational diabetes metformin that is commonly used and the other or glipizide"

"Basically gestational diabetes does not cause any kind of congenital abnormalities or anomalies of the fetus because gestational diabetes is the diabetes that is occurring in the pregnancy for the first time. It is entirely different from a woman who is having diabetes for many number of years before she has actually fallen pregnant. Overt diabetes means diabetes in a woman for a long time before she has fallen pregnant cases a lot of congenital abnormalities in the developing fetus. As far as gestational diabetes is concerned, the two main things that it causes is macrosomia, that is increased weight of the fetus, that is the babies weight goes up more than above 4 kgs and the water around the baby it increases, a condition called as polyhydramnios. As a consequence of polyhydraminios or macrosomia, there is overdistension of uterus, that is the diameter of the uterus increases and the placental size increases and because of this there is an early onset of preeclampsia that is hypertension in pregnancy and polyhydramnios can cause preterm labor, that is the patient going in for preterm labor much before 34 or 35 weeks of gestation. So the bottom line is since the diabetes has occurred after the conception, that is after the fertilisation, the problems that occur at the time of fertilisation are usually absent in gestational diabetes. It basically occurs in overt diabetes"