Hi gang – I want to chime in on this thread now. I scanned through it a month and a half ago, and ended up right here on Marie’s post. I ended up buying some of the plain rectangular patches (a 57 year old guy don’t need no hearts or turtles on his arm, c’mon…).
I was right on time for a new sensor, so I slapped one on and put one of the grips over the top. It lasted for about a week, then I was going CRAZY with pain!!! I pulled it off…
As you can see, the Grif Grip was put on over the top of the existing Dexcom sensor, and it held it down really well, but this is what my right arm looked like…
Oh my god, that hurt (it’s now a month later, and there is still a dry itchy patch on my right arm, FFS!). So, I had to figure something else out. While the grip itself held everything down really well, it just seems that _some_thing has changed in the makeup of the Dexcom sensor adhesive, though they tell me they have made no changes whatsoever.
I hit upon this idea then: I would create a patch to go UNDER the Dexcom sensor! This is what I did, step by step:
I cut off the edges of the sensor adhesive to make it a small rectangle, to the width of the grip:
I sacrificed one of the grips, using it as a template, then cut out that section of grip to go under only the reconfigured sensor adhesive:
NOTE: I can use that same cut up grip for a few more sensors now—maybe three more of them?.. four, possibly?..
I then put the grip up to the bottom of the sensor, and tapped a pen to mark the ‘hole’ that the sensor thread passes through:
I then bent the grip in half, and cut a hole through which the sensor thread could passes unabated…
…and ended up with these two parts:
I then peeled the backing off the sensor…
…and wed it to the back of the grip:
NOTE: You can see plenty of room for the señor thread to go through, bypassing the grip:
I then peeled off the grip backing…
…and slapped it on my left arm:
I snapped in the TX as per normal:
And, finally, I put a full Grif Grip over the top of everything:
Because I’d left a bit of the original adhesive under the grip, that thing has now been on my arm for THREE AND A HALF WEEKS, with NO ITCHING AT ALL! I don’t remember the last time I was able to restart a sensor FOUR TIMES (maybe never?..), but I am now halfway through the fourth week with this baby! I don’t actually think it will last much longer as the grip adhesive is finally wearing out, and the entire grip is starting to slough off.
Hope this helps.
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