BG METER ARRIVED, NOW WHAT?

[Q007]

Good evening all, Sorry to be a pest, but, after advice from the forum I bought myself a BG meter that arrived today. I chose the Bayer Contour Next USB, again after advice and I do hope I've chosen well with a machine that will give me accurate results.

The destruction manual is thicker than an instruction manual for a nuclear reactor, but unless I've missed something it falls short of a few things. I'm a newish T2 not on any meds HBA1C sound like this; 71 to 58 and most recent 43. Im in denial about diet and really desperate for the will power to cut down carbs, so presently my carb intake is very very high, so we start from here with my situation explained.

In view of the above, how many tests should I do per day to start off please? I eat twice per day usually, around noon then about 6pm is that ok? I get the part about testing before I eat but how long should I wait after I've eaten to do a BG test? The machine has a setting to flag a test when "fasting" what's that for? Finally what sort of scores should I be looking for - what is a good score?

I hope my message finds you all well,

With my kind wishes & regards,

Q..

 

[charon]

When I started I tested before and 2 hours after every meal, before going to bed and after waking up. That should give a good idea of what effect the meal has and how you are recovering.
Also - and I think this is important - I write down the times and data for everything I eat and each reading so I have something to look back over. Also doing this stops you pretending that some things don't matter - like the odd snack 7 times a day.

What to aim for isn't as important as whether you can control it - and you will only know that by testing.
Hopefully writing this down and seeing the effect that your meals have will give you the incentive to change if necessary. I treat it as a bit of a game to keep my readings low but don't mind the odd lapse as long as I check the BG to see what it has done and record it.

 

[janeecee]

MyFitnessPal is a phone app that let's you record your food intake and adds up all the carbs etc, and has a really good barcode scanner that seeks out just about every food you can buy in the shops and supermarkets. There is a website too but the app is excellent if you have a phone that supports it.


Sent from the Diabetes Forum App

 

[Ambersilva]

Q007,

You asked, "The machine has a setting to flag a test when "fasting" what's that for?" It means the test you take before meals.

I use the Contour USB (not the Next)

I think the Autolog facility on your meter is set to 'on'. I don't bother with before and after meal flags and have turned the Autolog feature to 'off' in the 'setup menu'.

 

[pav]

The flag option can be turned off on the usb next, though its handy having them on as when you look through your results (log book on the next usb) you can easily see when you have tested your self. A full apple shows as a before test and eaten apple (apple core) shows as a after meal test.

Don't forget to register the meter so you can send for your free mains charger, though some times they send these with the meter.