Is the Bayer covered by UHC?
That I am not sure ofâŚI dumped UHC as they hardly covered anything I needed that was doctor perscribedâŚyou could call and ask your pharmacy they would knowâŚ
UHC doesnât cover it on my plan. The only ones covered on my UHC plan are the One Touch
@Sam19
Canât find Truetest strips in 300q on Amazon right now.
What provider was that deal from?
Iâve been using TrueMetrix. 50q for $10 with free shipping from MA Health
Truetest strips have disappeared from Amazon. They were bought out and replaced by true metrix. How do you like them? Iâm considering switching to them when I stop hoarding the truetest strips off eBay.
The truemetrix are new and thereâs not a lot of reviews yet⌠The ones Iâve seen are mixed⌠But in very curious to hear from anyone using them.
I got the TrueMatrix meter from Costco. Relatively cheap entry point as I am paying out of pocket for testing â About $15 US.
I switched from OneTouch Ultra Mini, which although not many like it here, I loved. But too expensive to test 5-10 times daily. And I donât have a CGM yet.
I hate the plunger for the TrueMatrix, so I kept the one from OneTouch. TrueMatrix strips seem to use a fraction of the blood I needed for OneTouch.
I read the bad reviews of TrueMatrix online; it seems those are mostly related to the TrueMetrix meters â or maybe the strips â supplied to Walgreens and their diabetes health care plans.
Iâve never had a problem with this meter. The initial packet of strips was crazy variable â readings within a couple of minutes were not consistent, varying by 20-30 points. This may also have been during â in hindsight â the ending of my honeymoon period.
But I ordered a set of 50 strips from MA Health (one of many good distributors on Amazon), and am delightfully surprised at consistency in the past three packs of 50.
This has allowed me to adjust my basal (increased over the past six weeks), and respond to fluctuations in readings with exercise, or eating, etc. since I am not yet bolusing.
Testing more frequently has also helped me notice and adjust the timing of Metformin ER before my meals, which I notice can counteract my increases from my low carb diet meals. Call me crazy for seeing a pattern here. But right now, this is working for me.
I will not see endo until the âend oâ October. We will see where I am at in my process and progress then.
I have learned SOOO much thanks to everyone here at TuD (2D). Thank you for enlightening a newbie like me. 
1 Like
Thanks, we all learn a lot from each other. Keep us posted with how you like the true metrix over time, Iâm really hopeful that theyâll be a good consistent low priced option⌠Theyâre the only real player at that price point that isnât known to be garbage now that truetest is no longer being made. I speculate that trividia, the company who bought out nipro would have chosen to discontinue truetest and reintroduce something similar for two reasons 1) the market was absolutely flooded with truetest strips-- probably wrecking the profit margin. And 2) they were excellent⌠But werenât attractive to brand name enthusiasts (even though they work better for pennies on the dollar)
1 Like
How do I know (how can I quantify) whether Onetouch is garbage or not? What criteria has to be met in order for it to be deemed unsuitable? Iâm asking because, like you, my plans is for CVC/Caremark OneTouch and itâs what we currently useâŚbut Iâve not seen any problems at all with the OneTouch??? UNLESS I just donât recognize problems yet (son is fairly newly diagnosed in Feb of this year so weâre just coming up to speed on a lot of things.) How do I know if the OneTouch is + / - 40??? To meâŚthe meter IS the determining factor for BGâŚhow can it be off? And if itâs off, how would I know it???
Thanks beforehand.
If you can frequently test the same droplet of blood over and over again and get results that are 20-30 points off, at reasonably normal bg levelsâ itâs garbage in my estimation
1 Like
Okay, Iâll test the OneTouch on my own blood drop then. Thanks for the information! BTWâŚI didnât see Truetest afterallâŚI was seeing âTrue Balanceâ.
Thanks,
No prob⌠If youâre happy with one Touch and feel that they are giving you reasonably accurate results, I would just use them, but theyâre not for me⌠A few hundred tests with a meter and youâll have a pretty firm opinion on of its a good product or junk.
true balance is the lower end strip that formerly nipro made. Iâm told it doesnât compare to the quality of truetest but havenât used myself.
Well, Iâm at the stage right now where I donât know what I donât knowâŚthatâs why youâll find me asking a lot of questions here. 
Trying to find out how to even test/research things so that I can find out. I just tested myself and I got a 125 then a 155âŚblood drop dried up before I could do a 3rd test against the same drop. Very interesting finding, though. Next time I need to calibrate my sons G5, Iâll use his blood and see what happens. Soon, weâll be using the Omnipod PDM for out BGâs anywayâŚIâd love to find out how accurate that meter is! @rgcainmd, any info on that for me by chance?
1 Like
Wish I could say I was surprised, but that matches my experience with one-touch unfortunately. And you donât even have diabetes do you? So in all liklihood not only is that wildly inconsistent, but likely substantially higher than reality as well. Itâs amazing to me that anyone can manage with them.
Well, I just eaten a Nutty Buddy bar so I kind of attributed the high number to that.
1 Like
OmniPodâs PDM has a built-in Freestyle meter (which uses only Freestyle test strips. I believe Freestyle is one of the most accurate meters available.
1 Like
I told the story on this forum some time ago about how in a high school marketing class many years ago I demonstrated undeniably to random people that certain generic sandwich bags performed better than the more expensive name brand sandwich bags that they preferred. The majority of those people, absolutely bizarrely, stated that they would continue to purchase the higher priced brand name product that had just been proven before their very eyes to be inferior âbecause they are betterâ
Years later I am reminded of that class project I did 20+ years ago every time a discussion about glucose strips is had.
Sitting here doing paperwork tonight I came across a Ted talk podcast called âBrand over Brainâ in which they âexplore the seductive power of brand namesâ
Seems relevant to the discussion of blood glucose strips that are so outrageously overpriced that most people have to rely on an insurer to pay for themâŚ
Anyway, I opt for generic stripsâŚ
I agree something doesnât make sense about the true metrix reviews⌠The meters all have terrible negative reviews but the strips have excellent reviews? Theyâre kinda one and the same thingâŚ???
Maybe they had a quality control issue and shipped starter kits with bad strips or something? I emailed the mfg and asked what the deal isâŚ
1 Like
I have been using the Dario meter and have compared it to 4 other meters that I have and found it to be comparable and accurate for me. I like that it plugs into my phone and uses a small amount of red goo from my fingers. The free software for the phone is great because it will sink with my ipad and the online portal. The strips are a bit cheaper than most but not the cheapest. It is small and easy to carry around. Worth checking out. This is my five cents, I would have given my two cents but Canada does not use pennies any more.
1 Like
Replying late on this, but before jumping on this to buy a new meter, a little more investigation into whether this is something effected by better manufacturing/QA of the strips themselves, rather than a fundamental change in the technology.
I suspect this is more likely the case, than a re-engineered technology.
Not sure I agree the standards are too loose.
After living with and managing this disease for 16 years, intensively tight control for the last 3 with a CGM and pump, Iâm far less concerned about the tight accuracy of blood sugar reading.
Consider: Shoot for 100. If the meter is +/-20%, youâre between 80 and 120 with a reading of 100. I donât think thereâs really anything significant in terms of health impact with blood sugars at 80, or 120.
Similarly, if your hyper, say 180, you need to bring it down. Again, if youâre shooting for 100, and you over-treat because it says 180 but you;re really 150, then you may go down into the 70s. Not alarming.
Iâm not saying accuracy isnât important. Rather, Iâm saying that managing BG to single digits isnât important. Thereâs a safe, healthy range that we can shoot for and be completely at ease managing to (80-120). This allows our tools to safely be âapproximateâ rather than precise.