If you have type 2 diabetes .

It seems counter intuitive that non-insulin dependent diabetics should ever need to take insulin, but despite the advice of scores of diabetes experts who don't actually have diabetes, insulin is the one treatment that will always lower blood sugar levels in any kind of diabetes.

The benefit of taking insulin injections if you have type 2 diabetes is that injected insulin gives your pancreas a break. The injected insulin will then lower blood sugar levels and prevent further damage to the insulin-making beta cells.

The kind of insulin that benefits type 2 diabetics the most, depends on whether they tend to have high blood sugar levels before or after meals. There is a small number of type 2 diabetics who have a problem with high blood sugars in the morning but not after meals. These diabetics experience the "dawn phenomenon".

This unusual feature of diabetes results from the liver's abnormal response to pulses of stress hormones an hour or two before the usual waking time. The liver converts stored glycogen into glucose so the body can get "up and running" immediately at wake-up time. In this form of diabetes, which is common in women who have PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome), the underlying problem is with stress hormones. This pattern of high blood sugars is treated with "slow" insulin taken before going to bed.

The majority of type 2 diabetics, at least at first, have deficiencies of "first phase" insulin. Their beta cells continue to make insulin, but they can't release enough to cover the sudden load of glucose which follows on from digesting a meal. Most diabetics need injections of "fast" insulin 15 to 60 minutes before eating to keep blood glucose from getting too high.

Unfortunately, most type 2 diabetics get the exact opposite of the kind of insulin they need. If you are getting a fast insulin when you need a slow insulin, you will still have high fasting blood sugars but you'll also risk "falling out" when you exercise or if you don't eat enough. If you are getting a slow insulin when you need a fast insulin, your blood sugars will continue to soar after meals and your muscles and liver will become more and more insulin resistant.

And any diabetic who gets a mixture of the slower N and faster R insulins in a 50-50 or 70-30 mix is going to have blood sugars that are too high or too low essentially 24 hours a day.

Insulin is the one treatment for type 2 diabetes that will always lower blood sugar levels but it's really important to get the right kind. Be sure your doctor has tested both your fasting and post-prandial (after-meal) blood sugar levels and has explained exactly what insulin injections can do for your type 2 diabetes!