Guardian 3 CGM.

[Maco]

I just need to have a rant about the guardian 3 & see if anyone else has had problems, I’m using it with a 780G! At first everything went great for me but slowly but surely I’m starting to agree with all the negative comments I saw before starting the pump. I’m seriously thinking about running manual mode 24/7 & knocking the CGM on the head to be honest. 4 days ago I had 6 sensors fail the same day, all while in the warm up period. I just kept getting a ‘change sensor, problem with sensor’ alarm. As I’m writing this I’m now getting ‘sensor updating’ & it looks like this one is going to now fail as well.


I’m just getting the point where I can’t be bothered with the hassle of needing to change sensors every couple of days when they fail + I’m doing a BG test more than ever because I’m losing trust in the SG reading. Seems like it would just be easier to run the pump without the CGM and check my BG reading between and after meals.


I’m also not a fan of the automode auto correction, if you miscalculated carbs it’s brilliant and does bring you back into range after a couple hours. The problem I’m having with it is during gym sessions, luckily I’ve got keys to a gym so I’m still training and my sugars are spiking massively during my session and automode isn’t even attempting to do anything about it. I started my gym session today at 8.0 and 1hr after I finished I was upto 16.6. When I had all the troubles the other day with sensors failing I had to go into manual mode for half the day and my readings where pretty perfect. My basal rate most of been set correctly & my carb ratios are bang on too so I was in range all the time I was in manual mode.


Unfortunately I’m running very thin on trust for Guardian at the minute & the mega spikes during gym sessions is really running me down. With me training 6 days a week I’m having these spikes daily so it’s not fun. I’m based in the UK & get funding for the CGM, if I was paying for it I certainly wouldn’t be bothering!!

 

[Maco]

**Update**

So I managed to get the sensor working again after the sensor updating message, then tonight got it again and its gone on to fail and ask for a sensor change. Cant be bothered with it at the minute so ive turned smart guard off & gone back to manual mode. Personally I'm finding these sensors absolutely shocking and im starting to wish id gone for t-slim with Dexcom.

 

[Hopeful34]

Have you spoken to the hospital clinic about it, or the manufacturer? Were the sensors all the same batch number? It sounds a right pain!!

 

[Maco]

Have you spoken to the hospital clinic about it, or the manufacturer? Were the sensors all the same batch number? It sounds a right pain!!

Different batch numbers, Medtronic thought it could be a faulty batch so I opened a new box. I’ve gone through 8 sensors in less than 7 days. The day the 6 failed in a row Medtronic thought maybe a transmitter issue, they said if the 7th attempt failed they would change the transmitter even though it passed all troubleshooting tests. Typically the 7th worked but it’s failed tonight 4 days In.. my DSN phoned Friday to say they have a spare transmitter I could go to collect to save waiting for a new one. It’s just a massive hassle at the minute