Wednesday, October 7, 2009

A new day has come..

and a new experience is crossing my road. I'm a volunteer to test the Continuous Glucose Monitoring of my Paradigm 722 insulin pump. It means that a sensor will test my blood sugars every five minutes, so I can check my BG* whenever I want, without having to prick my finger. The system is not that reliable yet, that we will not need to prick our fingers to know our BG, but it's getting there. I will still need to test 4 times a day.

I hope it will be a big help to figure out what is happening with my glucose levels at night. I tend to wake up with high numbers and believe me, that's no fun at all. You feel tired and not rested and you are thirsty and not feeling your best. I could also test my BG every hour at night, and I have done that before. But the next day, you are a wreck and I do not want to do that again.

Unfortunately, the sensor is very expensive and we have to pay for it ourselves. One sensor costs 45 euro and you're supposed to detach it after 3 days. I hear some people leave it for 6 days and some even for 30 days. I don't know what my body will think about that. I'm afraid the skin would get infected and a rash would appear all around the sensor. I'll try to use it for as long as possible, so it will be worth the cost.

Let's keep our fingers crossed that the sensor will be of some use to me. Two friends of mine are testing too and their experience is totally different. We'll see!

*BG = Blood Glucose or the amount of glucose (sugar) in the blood


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