People with diabetes must monitor their blood-sugar levels regularly to avoid hyperglycemia and hypoglycemia. Regulating your diet is a way of ensuring your blood-sugar levels remain within normal parameters. One way of evaluating how a specific type of food will affect your blood-sugar levels is to know its glycemic index and overall sugar content. Because ground meat is primarily comprised of protein, it generally will not elevate your blood-sugar levels, according to the American Diabetes Association.
Glycemic Index
According to the American Diabetes Association, glycemic index, or GI, refers to how foods that contain carbohydrates affect blood sugar. Foods that possess a high GI elevate blood sugar more than foods with medium or low GIs. Diabetic meals typically include foods that have low or medium GIs. High GI foods are paired with low GI or avoided completely. Foods with fat and fiber tend to have lower GIs, while processed foods have higher GIs. However, this is not always true.
Protein and Blood Sugar
Ground meat contains protein, so the question is how protein and fat affect blood sugar. A study published in the 1997 issue of "The Diabetes Educator," examined the effects of carbohydrates, fat and protein on blood-sugar levels. The study involved diabetics with insulin deficiency and examined how protein affected their blood sugar. Your body uses insulin to metabolize protein. So theoretically people with insufficient insulin or insulin resistance would be unable to properly metabolize protein. However, the results of the study revealed that protein did not increase blood-sugar levels. The precise reasons why protein did not elevate blood sugar are not entirely clear. But one possible explanation is that your body takes a longer time to process protein compared with carbohydrates. Ground meat will not elevate your blood-sugar levels.
Ground Meat and Glycemic Index
Ground meat does not have a glycemic index, according to the American Diabetes Association. Unless the specific batch of ground meat contains meat extenders such as bread or soy, ground meat will not affect your blood-sugar levels. The specific dishes that contain ground meat sometimes contain additional ingredients that affect blood sugar. Hamburgers are typically made of ground meat and do not have carbohydrates if eaten alone. However, casseroles contain ground meat and, typically, ingredients with glycemic indices such as cheese and pasta.
Diabetes Meal
One way of incorporating ground meat into a healthy diet is to eat it with foods that will not elevate your blood sugar drastically. Fiber-rich foods such as non-starchy vegetables, legumes, nuts and whole grains are healthy options to consider, according to MayoClinic.com. Avoid adding salt to your meat and try to eat less than 2,000 mg of salt daily. Choose ground meat that does not contain more than 200 mg of cholesterol.
