Monitoring your diabetes at home

When it was finally confirmed that I was diabetic I decided that I wanted to do more than just take the Metformin and hope for the best.

I decided that I would be pro-active and that I would actively monitor my own blood glucose levels.

I and my wife visited a branch of Boots Chemists and looked at the range of home blood sugar test kits. The range was impressive and after some examination of what was available, my wife and I decided that we would buy an Accu-Chek unit by Aviva.

The one we decided to buy cost just under £16.00 and was able to add points to our Boots card!

The kit comes with a certain amount of sterile lancets and test strips to get you started with testing your blood sugar levels. The lancets and test strips are commonly available from all good chemists and pharmacists.

Although the test kits themselves aren't available on prescription the lancets and the test strips are available on prescription.

There is a comprehensive instruction handbook that comes with the kit and an equally comprehensive Quick Start Guide which had me testing my blood sugar levels within minutes, it really is that simple to operate.

It consists of the test unit itself which looks a little like a mobile phone and which sits very comfortably in the hand; a chip to put in the unit and a finger pricker which has a variable strength setting.

You fix the test strip in the unit, you fix the lancet drum on the finger pricker, prick your finger with it and then place the test strip end into the blood. Within approximately six seconds your blood sugar level appears on the tester.

The instructions carry information about error codes that might appear and how to deal with them.

To find out more about this and other blood glucose monitoring devices that Roche Diagnostics make you can visit www.accu-check.com or (in the UK) call 0800 701 000 or in Eire 1 800 709 600.