Glucose level

Glucose is the body's principal fuel. It is stored in the form of glycogen in the muscles and liver. The blood glucose level is simply the level of glucose in the bloodstream. On an empty stomach, this is normally one gram per liter of blood. When carbohydrates are ingested on an empty stomach, the effect on the blood sugar level is found to be as follows: The first stage is that blood glucose rises. The second stage is that, after insulin has been secreted by the pancreas, the blood glucose level falls and the glucose is released into the body's tissues. So, thirdly, the blood sugar level reverts to normal. Traditionally, it was usual to place carbohydrates in one of two distinct categories, quick sugars and slow sugars, the terms referring to the body's rate of absorbing them. Quick sugars were simple sugars and disaccharides, such as the sucrose found in refined sugars, honey and fruit. The term quick sugar owed its existence to the belief that, because of the simple nature of the molecule, the body rapidly absorbed these sugars after ingestion. Conversely, slow sugars referred to all carbohydrates whose more complex molecule had first to be chemically converted into simple sugar in the course of digestion. This applied notably to starches, from which, it was thought, and glucose was released into the body slowly and progressively. This way of classifying carbohydrates is today completely outdated, and is based on a misconceived theory.