The other night was very scary!
Tyler's meter said he was 275 at 9 pm which seemed odd, considering what we ate for dinner and the insulin it took to cover it. We checked it on another accu chek. It said 240, still kinda high we thought. But we averaged them and gave him insulin, 1 unit. Well at 11 pm he was 50, yup 50 with only one unit of insulin in his body. Down over 200 hundred points on one unit of insulin in two hours, ok this does not make sense. He only drops max 100 pts per unit. If I did not wake up to check he could have not awakened at all. It took me checking him every 45min. till 2 am feeding him each time. He would raise several points then drop.... There is no way he was as high as the machine said, no way. 1 unit of insulin would not cause such a drop. Accu chek said it was my error in dosing, not the machine ( they had me do some tests on the machine) I am sorry but 1 unit will not drop Tyler 200 points, period. You mean your machines can never make an error? I asked. Not if the test is normal now, she said. I thought, I make errors when I am normal. There was no way she was going to say the machine was a fault.
I kindly gave the lady on the phone an example of the 2 machines having different results testing at the same time. One machine said 61 and the other said 88. Her comment was not to compare machines. I went further to explain that I would have to treat the 61 and the 88 would not need to be treated. If I treated the 88, Tyler would go to high and if I ignored the 61 he could drop too low.... She again said only use one meter. That is an enormous difference ratio between meters.
There is legislation to mandate that companies that make glucometers have a better accuracy rate, some are up to 40 % off.... I'll believe it when it passes and it is enforced!
We have been doing a trial with the animas ping and the remote is also a meter. After checking Addison with it a couple of times where the number came up looking strange we tested again with our freestyle meter. The several times we did this..the animas meter was 30-100 points above what our normal meter said. That is not ok! Like you said..a 20 pt difference in readings can make a huge difference in the action you take. Lets keep our fingers crossed for the enforcement of better accuracy rate standards!
ReplyDeleteIt is infuriating how inaccruate meters are. And the excuse that these companies have for not using better technology is that mostly Type 2's use these meters and they don't need the accuracy.
ReplyDeleteIt angers me to no end. They are playing with peoples lives. We may not be the majority...but we matter none the less!
As though testing isn't enough to worry about without the added anxiety of knowing whether the test is even telling you the truth! Accu-chek's comments about not comparing meters are absurd and terribly irresponsible. The FDA stopped accepting comments on this issue on April 20th (mine is here: http://dontfeardiabetes.com/2010/03/fda-2009-n-0604/ ). I know many people submitted them and I hope hope hope that they get taken seriously.
ReplyDeleteWow, that is so scary!!! I had no idea that the meters could be so inaccurate!
ReplyDeleteI just found your blog while visiting Meri's blog, my name is Connie and I have two daughters ages 2 and 4 years old who were both diagnosed with type 1 diabetes within 11 months of each other. It scares me to think that these meters that I depend on could be so off...a low blood sugar in the middle of the night is probably one of my biggest fears right now and it is crucial for these meters to be giving us the right number.
We definately need that legislation to ensure better accuracy. Thank you for this information, let's hope we see a change soon.
Gosh, I'm sorry you guys had to go through that. I've had the SAME meter give us different readings within five minutes, and have been told to expect a 10-15% inaccuracy even on "good" meters. Any time T-Bear has an inexplicably high number, I ask him to wash his hands with soap again, and test again, before treating the high. Sometimes just having something on the towel he used to dry his hands is enough to give a way-off reading. Also, if I give him a correction with no food, he can drop really, really fast. Don't you just hate those bouncing BS's? :( - Mo
ReplyDeleteThat's incredible! Where can I vote or petition for more accurate testing. That sure makes it impossible to control. :( Sad for that
ReplyDeleteThe saddest part is it allowed to be that inaccurate!
ReplyDeleteI cannot seem to find the results of the legis. vote.... I will keep digging!