Self Blood Glucose monitoring (SBGM)
For sometime, the way to get serial readings from patient about his/her blood sugar levels was conducted at hospitals alone.Now a days, with the new self blood glucose monitoring equipment (SBGM), things have greatly reduced in terms of cost and time to conduct the test.
Persons can monitor their blood sugar levels by using special strips to check glucose through urine or you can use strips to monitor blood glucose by taking a drop of blood using an autolancer or a sterile prick. These glucose monitors are small rectangles made of plastic which are coated with chemicals. These chemicals reacts with the glucose in blood to produce a color change. As mentioned about Urine strips and Blood strips, lets discuss about these two glucose monitoring systems in detail –
Test using Urine strips –
To test urine sugar by Diastix or Glucosix test, the strip should be dipped in the urine and remove it immediately. If you are an insulin dependent diabetic having high urine sugar, its important that you test regularly for urine ketone. Good control of diabetes is indicated by fasting blood sugar of 80 to 120 mg% and a 2 hour post meal blood sugar of 80 to 150 mg%
Using Blood Test strips –
There are two basic forms of SBGM test –
1. Using test strips readable by naked eye
2. Using test strips readable by glucometers.
Eye readable test strips are not very accurate but they give you a decent idea of the blood sugar range and also its more convenient and cheap since no meter needs to be carried out. The strips too can be saved for over a week, to be read by others if the patient is unable to do it himself.
Some patients may prick their finger freely which others would prefer an autolancer to minimize sore fingers. Blood test of blood glucose may seem a lot more inconvenient than urine testing, but once you get used to it and learn the art of testing, accuracy will be maximized and the benefits are worth.