She called me in from the waiting room. We entered the exam room and we sat down. She started explaining how to use the device, a Dexcom 7 continuous glucose meter (CGMS). She explained that it consisted of three parts, a sensor, a transmitter and a receiver. The sensor would be embedded just under my skin, the transmitter would send readings every minute to the receiver which I had to keep within 5 feet of my body. Easy enough.
She walked me through calibrating the Dexcom ( two sequential meter readings uploaded to the Dexcom from a OneTouch Ultra ) and reminded to make one meter reading every 12 hours to keep the 7 updated. She then handed me some sheets of paper for keeping a food and insulin dosage log. She also wrote down her phone number. "Call me if you have any questions or issues".
She then showed me how to insert the sensor ( on my belly ) and snap in the sensor. Quite painless I must say.
I left. The first day was a little frustrating. The 7 kept telling me I had a low ( below 70 ) but my meter ( if in doubt test ) said I was over 100. Hmm ... three more finger pricks later and I had the 7 in tune with reality. Or so I thought.
I are lunch and fully expected that two hours later my BG would be about 120. Nope. The 7 says I am 256. The meter says 134. Sigh! Recalibrate again. I finish up my work day and head home for dinner.
My wife and kids want to see the "alien" on papa. "Does it hurt", asks my 7 year old. She's so cute.
Around 10 PM the 7 buzzes and displays a blood droplet icon. Time to calibrate. One more finger prick ( that's over 10 today ) and I am off to dreamland. Er ... ahh .. not quite... the 7 wakes me up around 2 PM. "LOW!". I test, curse at the frackin device, and go back to bed.
Day two and three were similar although there was much less testing. About 4 per day.
So what's the frackin point again!!
Yesterday, my endo and I looked at the numbers from my FreeStyle Flash. He plots a graph. "This look good". My average BG is 104.
Do I really need to join the collective.