BACKGROUND: It has been established that careful diabetes self-management is 
essential in avoiding chronic complications that compromise health. Disciplined 
diet control and regular exercise are the keys for the type 2 diabetes 
self-management. An ability to maintain one's blood glucose at a relatively flat 
level, not fluctuating wildly with meals and hypoglycemic medical intervention, 
would be the goal for self-management. Hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c or simply A1c) is a 
measure of a long-term blood plasma glucose average, a reliable index to reflect 
one's diabetic condition. A simple regimen that could reduce the elevated A1c 
levels without altering much of type 2 diabetic patients' daily routine denotes 
a successful self-management strategy.
METHODS: A relatively simple model that relates the food impact on blood glucose 
excursions for type 2 diabetes was studied. Meal is treated as a bolus injection 
of glucose. Medical intervention of hypoglycaemic drug or injection, if any, is 
lumped with secreted insulin as a damping factor. Lunch was used for test meals. 
The recovery period of a blood glucose excursion returning to the pre-prandial 
level, the maximal reach, and the area under the excursion curve were used to 
characterize one's ability to regulate glucose metabolism. A case study is 
presented here to illustrate the possibility of devising an individual-based 
self-management regimen.
RESULTS: Results of the lunch study for a type 2 diabetic subject indicate that 
the recovery time of the post-prandial blood glucose level can be adjusted to 4 
hours, which is comparable to the typical time interval for non-diabetics: 3 to 
4 hours. A moderate lifestyle adjustment of light supper coupled with morning 
swimming of 20 laps in a 25 m pool for 40 minutes enabled the subject to reduce 
his A1c level from 6.7 to 6.0 in six months and to maintain this level for the 
subsequent six months.
CONCLUSIONS: The preliminary result of this case study is encouraging. An 
individual life-style adjustment can be structured from the extracted 
characteristics of the post-prandial blood glucose excursions. Additional 
studies are certainly required to draw general applicable guidelines for 
lifestyle adjustments of type 2 diabetic patients.