As part of the StripSafely initiative, a media outlet has approached Bennet Dunlap (the advocate behind the initiative), asking if he knew anyone who had gotten a bad experience with a blood glucose meter (in particular if it's been a cheaper "white label" brand).
Think of a case where you tested, got a result that was off (as in showing you as being high when you were actually low or in the normal range), and either dosed insulin to treat the high or were about to treat it, and decided to test with a different meter and could confirm that the previous reading was off. In particular, it would be particularly valuable to hear examples where you were able to reproduce the wrong value (consistently bad, when using multiple strips with the same meter).
Please connect with Bennet Dunlap @ Stripsafely (admin@StripSafely.com) for more info.
Yes! Tested high, corrected & began to feel the telltale signs of a hypo. Tested again with the same meter (normal range) & another meter (normal range). The first high reading was way off. Neither meter was a white label brand.
I haven't found the name brand meters to be any better (as a group than the generics). When I'm high or low I always retest and I don't find that meters are particularly accurate when high or low. A high in the 200 range gets a retest before insulin, and a low that I'm not feeling gets a retest. Generally, I might take a glucose tablet with a low and then retest (and possibly take more glucose), but going up 20 points isn't a big deal. I've been using cheap generic strips pretty early on so retesting isn't too pricey.
The One Touch Ultra seemed to give me a lot of scores that were out in left field, and while the Walmart Relion was decent, it would occasionally give me something way off too. With my current generic and current name brand meter those scores are very rare. Sure it may be off by 20, but not 60.
The problem for me is when I get my A1C tested and it's consistently higher than the meter (or CGM) because the meter is consistently off.
I had the same experience with one touch meters being extremely inaccurate. I think the name brand vs. generic argument is bogus. I've had very good luck with the Relion and if I do ever feel I need to retest, .18 cents is much better than 1.25 for the name brand strips.
A bad meter is a bad meter whether it is name brand or "white label".
I concur regarding generics working better than onetouch for me. I think the concept of a1c is a bit more complex than we can expect to precisely and reliably pin down precisely based on a average meter readings though. I certinly have observed far more repeatable results with generic truetest strips than with onetouch
I recently had a 4 day constant monitoring of my blood sugar. When I visited the doctor's office to have it removed, they took my blood sugar with their glucometer. My reading was 110. I had my own glucometer with me, and I asked to confirm the reading with my own meter. It read 60. It was a full 50 points lower! I was concerned and mentioned this to my endocrinologist, and he said that that is an anticipated sampling error. Within the week, I had two A1C tests made by two physicians within 30 minutes of each other. One score result was 7.0 and the other was 6.7. It was another sampling error.
