Hi, Pete from Barnsley. Diagnosed a week ago with T2D

[petemorris]

Hi, being new to this malarkey.

A couple of questions. I bought a blood sugar test meter (Accu-CHEK), and its units of measurement are mmol/l. I know there is another unit of measurement (not sure what it's called). But is this something readily recognizable and used by the medical profession?

I know the test strips are kinda expensive. Is this something you can get on prescription (age 66).

Thanks in advance for any responses.
Pete

 

[Leadinglights]

Welcome to the forum
Yes a home testing monitor measures in mmol/l and is a spot test gives your blood glucose level at that moment in time. The other measurement is from your HbA1C test which is in mmol/mol and is a average of your blood glucose level over the previous 3 months and is the test used for diagnosis.
Sadly you are unlikely to get strips prescribed on prescription as a Type 2 so many self fund. But the monitor with the cheapest strips is the GlucoNavil £10 for the monitor and £13 for 100 strips, so you may recoup the cost of that monitor quite quickly depending on how expensive the strips are for the monitor you bought.
If you are on certain medication for diabetes that could cause low blood glucose eg gliclazide then your GP should prescribe a monitor and strips.

 

[petemorris]

Thank you for that information, it's most helpful. There's a chemist directly next door to my GP surgery. I bought the monitor from there, and was the only one they had...You live and learn I guess.

 

[trophywench]

NB - Leadinglights message got the spelling slightly wrong - its the Gluco Navii - a double i .

But anyway, it is both cheap, pretty accurate and reliable according to what members of this forum have found over the last few years. However - it isn't available over the counter in pharmacies or elsewhere - you have to buy both it and the strips over the internet. One other thing - as you've already bought an Accu-Chek meter, presumably you already also have their finger bodger, with the little cassette thingy of actual lancets to do the deed - and that bodger (called a Fastclix) is by far the kindest one to fingers available anywhere, so in that case, I personally recommend that you do try and buy a box of their cassettes, even though they'll be more expensive than the cheaper ones. PS despite what the instructions tell us all, it isn't really 100% necessary to use a new lancet for every single blood test we do - obviously if you're mucking out pigsties all day, yes you do - but as long as you don't have mucky hands/ aren't digging sewage, you can use em quite a lot more than once - they ruddy hurt once they've gone blunt!

 

[Leadinglights]

NB - Leadinglights message got the spelling slightly wrong - its the Gluco Navii - a double i .

But anyway, it is both cheap, pretty accurate and reliable according to what members of this forum have found over the last few years. However - it isn't available over the counter in pharmacies or elsewhere - you have to buy both it and the strips over the internet. One other thing - as you've already bought an Accu-Chek meter, presumably you already also have their finger bodger, with the little cassette thingy of actual lancets to do the deed - and that bodger (called a Fastclix) is by far the kindest one to fingers available anywhere, so in that case, I personally recommend that you do try and buy a box of their cassettes, even though they'll be more expensive than the cheaper ones. PS despite what the instructions tell us all, it isn't really 100% necessary to use a new lancet for every single blood test we do - obviously if you're mucking out pigsties all day, yes you do - but as long as you don't have mucky hands/ aren't digging sewage, you can use em quite a lot more than once - they ruddy hurt once they've gone blunt!

Thanks, never spotted that before. Must need new glasses.

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

Welcome to the forum @petemorris

I’ve taken the liberty of shortening your username to avoid potentially revealing your email address to the world 🙂

Good to hear you got yourself a BG meter, they can be really helpful in terms of fine-tuning your menu to suit your individual tolerances to different sources and amounts of carbohydrate.

The Accu-chek brand is very well respected, but as you’ve discovered it is something of a premium product, where others are available which perform well with substantially cheaper consumables.

One of the biggest questions when trying to get to grips with your diabetes is often ‘what can I eat’ and while there are obvious things like cakes, biscuits, sweets and sugary drinks that you will want to cut out straight away, you might be surprised how much *all* carbohydrate affects your BG levels, including rice, pasta, potatoes, bread, pastry, grains, cereals and many fruits.

The really tricky thing is that blood glucose responses to various foods are highly individual, and it can be impossible to say which types and amounts of carbohydrate will ‘spike’ your BG without checking for yourself.

You can use a BG meter, taking a reading before and again 2hrs after eating, to see what the differences are, to identify any carbs that seem to be spiking BG (initially in a way the numbers themselves matter less than the differences between them). Ideally you would want to see a rise of no more than 2-3mmol/L at the 2hr mark. Once you can see how you respond to different meals you can begin experimenting with reducing portion sizes of the carbs where you see bigger rises. You might find that you are particularly sensitive to carbohydrate from one source (eg bread), but have more liberty with others (eg oats or basmati rice) - It’s all very individual! You might even find that just having things at a different time of day makes a difference - with breakfast time being the trickiest.

Over weeks and months of experimentation you can gradually tweak and tailor your menu to find one that suits your tastebuds, your waistline, your budget and your BG levels - and a way of eating that is flexible enough to be sustainable long-term. 🙂

If you are interested in this approach you may find test-review-adjust by Alan S a helpful framework.