Tracking Your Results
In order to use your blood glucose results to guide management successfully, you need to understand how to interpret them. Here are some tips to help you:
- Monitoring systems: different monitoring devices or meters use different methods to measure blood glucose and may give different results, even if the tests have been performed correctly and at the same time. Use only one type of device to obtain an overall picture of your blood glucose trends.
- Test and check the results: some people think they can tell what their blood glucose is by how they feel, but this is often not the case and you should always test to be sure. If your blood glucose result does not match the way you feel, retest your blood glucose and check the test is performed as instructed by the manufacturer of the device.
- Timing of monitoring: it takes 1 to 2 hours before you can tell the effect that your meal has had on your blood glucose. Blood glucose tests carried out immediately after eating will not really provide any useful information. Discuss any changes in your blood glucose with your diabetes care team.
- If your blood glucose is higher than your agreed target range 1 to 2 hours after eating, your carbohydrate servings may have been too large, or your medication dose could have been inadequate for that meal.
- Blood glucose can be lower than normal after exercise, and may remain lower than normal for several hours. If it gets too low, you may need to adjust your medication.
- Your results can be affected by illness, hormonal changes (e.g. during the night, menopause, menstrual cycles), stress, changes in medication, changes in dietary intake and reduced levels of physical activity.
Bayer’s CONTOUR® and CONTOUR® USB blood glucose monitoring systems can help you simplify keeping track of pre- and post-meal results. To learn more, click here.
Blood glucose testing is important, but you need to test more than just blood sugar. Testing also includes a test done by your doctor, called Hemoglobin or A1C testing, which looks at your average blood sugar level over the last 2 to 3 months. For a simple way to check your A1C in between doctor visits, Bayer’s A1CNow™ SELFCHECK is the first and only at-home A1C test with results in 5 minutes. To learn more, click here.
Source: American Diabetes Association:
Checking your Blood Glucose