What equipment controls my glucose levels?

For diabetics, control of everyday blood glucose levels is the only most important aspect of disease management. Maintaining blood glucose at a healthy normal level helps diabetics in the short term better and drastically reduces complications in the long term. With ghosts of heart disease, blindness, kidney failure, limb amputation and dementia hovering in a poorly controlled future of diabetics, good control now means better quality of life later.

doctors have long known that the presence of glucose in urine means that a diabetic generally has a high blood glucose level. Negative glucose urine means that diabetes is under better control, but how much better? Urine glucose test is at best an inaccurate test. For many years, medical laboratories have checked glucose levels for glucose levels. In the United States, this number is expressed as milligrams on the deciliter (Mg/DL), while the international standard expresses a level like a million per liter (mmol/l). Gross conversion from one to anotherIt is achieved by multiplying the MMOL/L number 18 to arrive to read Mg/DL, or by dividing the Mg/DL number by 18 to obtain the equivalent of MMOL/L.

So each person can get blood glucose levels either by checking his blood by laboratory (usually through a doctor) or using a blood glucose meter. These are small devices that use proprietary strips that take a small drop of blood and provide reading blood glucose levels.

Anton Clemons patented the first blood glucose meter for domestic use in 1971, while working for the Ames research group. Other companies have caught up and began to develop their own meters, but at the age of 80 they were almost gone before they became common home blood glucose meters in diabetic houses before most insurance companies would cover them. Nowadays advertisements on home blood glucose meters are all over television and coupons for themThey evoke in newspapers and magazines.

The method that these meters actually measure blood glucose is too complex for the article of this extent. However, it is understood that these meters are generally accurate +/- 20 percent, usually a narrower margin. However, even within these parameters, it is possible for a diabetic to achieve a good control using the values ​​of the glucose domestic monitor. For example, if the meter reads 110 mg/dl, reading could be up to 132 or low up to 88. However, most meters are much closer to the actual number than 20 percent and the user experience with a particular meter gives him a "feeling" for how the meter usually reads.

Glucose meters in the blood come in a wide range of styles with many different features. Some meters use individual test strips, while some models have a disk filled with strips inside the meter itself. Some have a backlight on deductibles and some are streamlined to fit into their handbags or pockets. It is recommended to check the diabetic to see which brands its insurance will coverbefore purchasing a subway. The meters are relatively cheap and sometimes they are free. However, strips are expensive, sometimes for more than $ 100 in the US for 100 test strips. A person with insurance can apply Co-Pay, usually for 300 strips at a time, saving a large amount of money if the doctor prescribes meters and strips.

diabetics in the 21st century are extremely fortunate to have access to reasonably accurate tools for measuring blood glucose levels. Whether their equipment includes a medical laboratory or a home glucose meter, this knowledge allows diabetics to live longer, happier and healthier lives.