Monitoring your Diabetes - How to Effectively Monitor your Diabetes at Home

Learning how to monitor your blood glucose levels is a primary aspect in diabetes management. It helps in timely screening and treatment of related conditions such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol and other diabetic complications. In this hub I’ll be guiding you a bit about how you can monitor your blood glucose levels at home effectively and with ease.

The blood glucose levels of a diabetic person fluctuate more quickly than a non-diabetic one. Here is a chart featuring the comparison between the glucose levels of both during the day (with/without fasting):

Monitoring your glucose levels at home serves many purposes, including:

• Makes it easier to detect low glucose levels so you can treat it before it drops too low (particularly useful to check before driving or exercising)
•  Allows detecting high glucose levels (reflects dietary indiscretion or failure to take or to adjust diabetes medications)
• Makes you modify your lifestyle and routine
• Helps plan your diet and meals
•  Allows adjusting medication doses (particularly insulin)

A glucose meter is a battery-operated handheld device with a display screen and a hole to insert a thin plastic glucose test strip . You prick your fingertip, let the blood out and touch it with the tip or side of test strip. Then you insert the strip into the hole. The chemicals in the strip react with glucose in the blood and produce a tiny electrical current that makes the data displayed on the display screen. The test strip is then discarded.

You can find plenty of glucose meters in the market which are available at low cost ranging from fifty to hundred dollars each. These are special devices used to measure the book glucose levels and can be used easily at your home. Different models from various brands vary in their size of display screen, backlight, voice guide, size of blood drop required, blood sample sufficiency sensors, result speed, storage of previous record, mode of display, and result analysis.

If you’re insulin-treated (type 1 diabetes) patient it is advisable to check glucose levels at least 4-6 times a day. If you’ve type 2 diabetes you should check 2 times a day at least. Here are some steps to check your levels:

1. Wash your hand properly before checking.
2. Prick the fingers carefully; it hurts less if you prick your fingers on the side than on the tip.
3. Use a fresh test strip; avoid expired ones at all cost.
4. Check readings carefully –US and European glucose meters have different scale. A US-made meter will show results in mg/dl and a Europe-made will show in mmol/L. For conversion, use these formulae:

mmol/L = mg/dl divided by 18

mg/dl = mmol/L multiplied by 18

It’s very important to record your glucose level values. You can either write it in your diary/log or in a computer file. You can find plenty of such free printable diabetes logs/charts online and here are a few applications for your PC and phone too. Here is a list of useful resources you can use for tracking and monitoring:

Ultimate List of Diabetes Monitoring, Tracking & Recording Resources

Diabetes Software for Blood Glucose Monitoring - A Good Hub to Read

A List of Diabete Software Available Online and for Phone