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Codefree BG meter settings

Sam50

Well-Known Member
Messages
228
Location
West Sussex
Type of diabetes
Don't have diabetes
Treatment type
Diet only
Morning All,

This is a question for those of you who test using the Codefree BG meter. I bought one of these for Hubby when he was diagnosed in June and it has 3 settings. Pre-meal, post meal and default. Setting it to 'post meal' when testing 2 hours after eating is straightforward enough.

Should it be set to 'pre-meal' when testing at other times or only if testing just before eating ? Both Hubby and I have read through the instruction booklet and can find no definitive reason why you would use 'default' at other times. Normally if he was doing a random check (more than 2 hours since eating) he would set the meter to default but I am now wondering whether he has been doing it wrong

On Monday he checked his BG and it was 14, this was having just started a streaming cold, eaten pizza and and had a stressful return journey from holiday. On Friday he tested again ( about 4.5 hours after eating) and it said 13.8. This seemed too high to him as he was feeling a lot better so he checked again on the pre-meal setting and it told him 10 which is more what he was expecting.

So was the meter telling porkies or has he just been doing it wrong-should he be using the pre-meal setting not the default one ?

any advice would be welcome....
 
Hi @Sam50 ..
Whatever setting your meter is on makes absolutely no difference to the actual blood sugar reading. These settings are only relevant if you are downloading your readings to an app or a PC. For me, it's easier to simply note each reading and put it on to a spreadsheet manually .. then you can design graphs or whatever as you wish.

More important, however, is that your hubby's readings are too high .. and I guess this is largely to do with his diet. For example a reading of 14 after eating pizza is not altogether surprising .. even if he was unwell.

You will be aware that there is a lot of conflicting and sometimes confusing information around .. but the key point to take on board is that managing and controlling your diabetes (or pre-diabetes) through exercise, diet and testing your blood glucose seems to be the best way forward for many people. For me, committing to an LCHF (Low Carb High Fat) lifestyle and testing 3-5 times a day seems to be working and you'll find that there is a wealth of info, relevant advice and positive support about LCHF on the forum. I suggest that you read up on the discussion on the Low Carb Diet forum .. together with the following Diet Doctor websites, which will give you all the info that you need about carb levels and about what and what not to eat ...
Low Carb Intro and Information and Low Carbs in 60 Seconds

It's good that you are testing and I'm sure you'll find that adopting an LCHF lifestyle will soon bring your levels down. I recommend that you test before meals and then again two hours after you started to eat. You will soon develop your own testing pattern which will enable you to monitor trends over time and to spot any foods that cause your blood sugar to "spike" or fall ouside the normal ranges. The ranges that you are looking for are ..
# Before meals: 4 to 7 mmol/l
# 2 hours after meals: under 8.5 mmol/l
I've been testing 3-5 times a day since I was diagnosed in February, which means that I now know what my BG levels are .. and I can now manage them

Hope this helps
 
Those settings do not affect the readings, they are just markers so that you can tell later what time the test was done. I think the meter can use them to work out averages for pre-meal for examples. I leave mine on default and do any averages etc on a spreadsheet.
 
Hi and thanks for your reply. Hubby has been on a LCHF diet for a couple of months now and seen his BG come down from 21 (when he first got the BG meter) to an average of 8.5-10 so we know that he is headed in the right direction . The pizza was thanks to our son ordering in a takeaway when we were delayed flying home from holiday !! (kind thought)

It's interesting that the meter settings should make no difference-in which case I'll assume that the meter was just having a moment as you cannot be 13 on one reading then 10 the next minute ! thanks again x
 
I ignore the settings. I did use them to begin with but kept forgetting to set pre-meal! I put all my readings into the MySugr app which has many more situations to choose from anyway, like bedtime, snack, feeling hypo, fasting etc…
 
Sam50 said:
It's interesting that the meter settings should make no difference-in which case I'll assume that the meter was just having a moment as you cannot be 13 on one reading then 10 the next minute ! thanks again x
Click to expand...
Meter readings are not always consistent as meters are only about +/- 10% accurate but the usual reason for bigger differences is contamination on your fingers. Always wash and dry thoroughly first, also using warm water makes hands bleed more freely.
 
I never use those settings. All mine are lumped together, but I do record all my readings on a spread sheet in columns. A column for each event (fasting, 2 hours after breakfast, before lunch ... and so on. If there is anything unusual happening I put a note on so I can look back and see why I was higher that time. I can then average each column, so I have an average of all my fastings, all my post breakfasts etc etc. I can then average across all of them for a daily/weekly/monthly average or whatever I want.

I also never look at my meter averages because they include duplicate tests (re-tests) and other random ones etc.
 
that's a good point about hand washing before testing- don't think Hubby generally does so I shall remind him to in future-thanks x
 
Sam50 said:
that's a good point about hand washing before testing- don't think Hubby generally does so I shall remind him to in future-thanks x
Click to expand...

Yes, it is an important point, and after washing with soap it is a good plan to rinse thoroughly under running water - soap residue may affect results - and dry thoroughly.
 
I have never set anything on my codefree.
 
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