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Freestyle Libre - max scans

C

crocky

Member
Messages
5
Hi,

Now that it is becoming available on the NHS I am considering buying the Freestyle Libre system. The question I have is “ is there a maximum number of scans you can do in a day, week or month?” - can you keep scanning without any restrictions?

Any information will be much appreciated
Paul
 
Hello Paul,

You have unlimited scans within the 2 weeks of the life of the sensor. The scan records a trace of your glucose for the previous 8 hours so at the minimalist end of things it is prudent to scan at intervals of no more than 8 hours or data may be lost.
 
I think of a Libre slightly differently to finger pricks.
The sensor on your arm is doing the equivalent of finger pricks every 5 minutes (I think). It stores the last 8 hours worth of BG readings on the sensor. When you scan the sensor you are downloading the last 8 hours of readings to your receiver (phone or monitor). You can do this download as many times as you want. But it is a good idea to do it at least every 8 hours if you do not want to miss any readings.
As a consequence, the Libre gives you much more than your BG at a given point in time. It can tell you the affect your last meal had over time, it can show you what happened to your BG whilst you were cycling this morning, for example, you can compare the impact of a stressful meeting with a relaxed meeting, and you can see whether your BG is rising or falling a the moment.
I feel if you are using a Libre only to replace finger pricks, you are missing out on 75% of its power. It's like having a Smart phone just to make calls.
 

Scan away, man, scan away! It's unrestricted. I was on holiday when I first got it, and scanned about 50 times a day just because of the novelty of the thing.

A little tip: there are differences between a scan and a bg meter reading, so in the first couple of weeks, I ended up scanning a lot and also bg testing a lot more than usual, maybe about 15 a day. I did that so that so I could figure out what the differences were and then make adjustments in my head, so that I could then say, ok, scan says this, but bg will probably say that.

After a few months, I eventually decided I was ok bolusing from it. I generally only calibrate it with 1 or 2 bg tests a day now.

Have fun, it takes a bit of getting used to but once you do it levels the playing field a lot.
 


Hi Paul
Hope you don’t mind me asking but did the Freestyle Libre become available on the NHS for type 2 or only type 1.
Thanks
Margaret
 
margauxwaguas1 said:
Hi Paul
Hope you don’t mind me asking but did the Freestyle Libre become available on the NHS for type 2 or only type 1.
Thanks
Margaret
Click to expand...
It is made available for insulin dependent T2s, but much depends on local NHS policy though prescribing it is slowly gaining ground throughout the UK. I was lucky as I was prescribed the Libre a couple of years ago and it made an vast improvement in my blood glucose management.
 
margauxwaguas1 said:
Hi Paul
Hope you don’t mind me asking but did the Freestyle Libre become available on the NHS for type 2 or only type 1.
Thanks
Margaret
Click to expand...

Hi there, speaking as a type 1, all I can say is you really have to jump through hoops for one, it's certainly not freely available (as I think it should be for all those on insulin at least). Not all type 1s have it, I think at the last count less than 30% of type 1s had managed to get one on the NHS and as I say, the criteria is strict.
 
Its a post code lottery with regard if you get one I know there are a lot of “ hoops to jump through in certain areas but I’m in Scotland and no hoops at all I’m not sure but ith8nk no most if not all health authority areas now give Libre system to T1 diabetics , it’s a game changer as far as I’m concerned , but beware of trying to chase blood sugars due to amount of info you can get in short space of time ,
 
crocky said:
is there a maximum number of scans you can do in a day, week or month?”
Click to expand...

I don't think there is a limit.

The device keeps a record of what has happened for the last 90 days and it shows I have scanned 3268 times in those 90 days which is an average or 36 scans per day.

The only problem I have found doing this many scans is that it now takes about 10 seconds to open the logbook (which shows the details of all the scans and food/insulin entries per day). Once opened, there is no delay in scrolling through the various days or selecting another day via the calendar, but if I actually open an entry (for example to see how much insulin I took at a particular time), then although those details open immediately, when I have finished and want to go back to the logbook the 10 second delay re-occurs. Hence it can be time consuming to compare several different entries.

All other reports/features work without a noticeable delay.
 
There is no limit on the number of scans, it’s wise to scan at least every 8 hours as said above so that you don’t lose any data.

there are also third party apps which can automatically read the sensor and give you a continuous reading without scanning. For android phones there is diabox, for iPhones xdrip works well.
 
There is a limit on the number of scans you can do in a short period of time. I had a bad episode (I'm sure you know what I mean) and was scanning every 10 minutes. After about 10 scans it stopped working with the message "No data available. Scan again in 10 minutes". But it took around 20 minutes before it would scan again. I think you always need a finger pricker and BG meter as a backup.
 
That likely had to do with a rapid change in blood glucose, not with scanning every 10 minutes.
If your BG changes too fast the sensor recognises it cannot give you trustworthy data so it stops working.
I agree with always having a fingerprick possibility as a back-up.
 
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