Influence of glycaemic index on day-long glycaemia in type 2 diabetics

People with type 2 diabetes will be given food for four days to cover breakfast, lunch and dinner. For two of the days they will eat low glycaemic index foods, for the other two days high glycaemic index foods. The order of the low and high glycaemic index periods will be randomized to each person. The low glycaemic index foods will be Kelloggs Special K breakfast cereal, Vogels Soy and Linseed bread for lunch, and Watties Chicken Penne pasta frozen meal for dinner. The corresponding food on the high glycaemic index days will be Sanitarium Weetbix, Natures Fresh white bread and Watties rice and chicken frozen meal. The foods were chosen to have the same available carbohydrate content. ie: the frozen rice and pasta meals contained equivalent carbohydrate; the slices of Vogels and Natures Fresh bread contained equivalent carbohydrate; and the amount od Special K consumed was matched for carbohydrate content with the number of Weetbix biscuits. In recognition that different people eat different amounts of food, each person was free to choose the amount (ie: 2 slices or 4 slices of bread at lunch). However, if a person ate four white slices during the high glycaemic index phase then they were told to eat four Vogels slices during the low glycaemic index phase. The same principles applied to breakfast and dinner meals (people will be supplied with two of each frozen meal per day with a choice to consume one or both, if one meal is sufficient then one pasta meal will be consumed each of the low glycaemic index days and one rice meal on each of the high glycaemic index days). Bread fillings and any additional snack foods will be weighed and recorded. During this period, interstitial glucose concentrations will be measured with a continuous glucose monitoring device. The low and high glycaemic index periods will be consecutive with no washout.