Tag Archives: control

Blood tests

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Today was my three month doctor visit. Since I have a chronic illness, I need to have my blood tested 4 times a year.

So, as you would guess, I have had my blood tested an awful lot. What makes it harder is that I have what the phlebotomists call difficult veins. It isn’t my fault, I didn’t make them this way. But, some of the phlebotomists treat me that way. Sort of like they are thinking “Why are you making my day difficult”.

It is hard enough getting your HbA1C tested. You are worried that your numbers are okay, and you feel like you are going to be judged. Having an annoyed phlebotomist doesn’t help matters.

Luckily, I didn’t get an annoyed phlebotomist…I got one in training. So, instead of annoyed, she got all flustered. Honestly, I don’t do it on purpose. My veins are just small.

On a better note, I heard a couple of things from my doctor. He has heard that continuous glucose monitoring has started to be covered by health insurance. A Medtronic rep will be in his office soon, and I can talk to her about the possibility of getting one. Yay!

Glucose fuel cell

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RatSomeone forwarded me this news story: Power from Glucose. The article is about how some scientists have created a device that can turn glucose into energy (while in the body of a rat).

I was curious what would happen in a diabetic… Would the excess blood sugar mean more energy, or would it gunk everything up? Could it be used to easily tell someone’s blood sugar level? If higher glucose level means more energy, that should be easy to display, don’t you think? (My husband was joking about little lights on my arm that we could glance at. If the light goes out, eat more.  If the other light turns on, add more insulin.)

Scientists were trying to come up with something that could fuel medical devices, but perhaps it can be used for glucose levels too.

Sick Days

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Person holding a tissue over their nose

This has not been a great week for me health-wise. I started the week with a case of food poisoning. I’m guessing that was just enough hit to my immune system to allow me to catch a nasty cold. Blah. I had to dip into my records to find my sick day plan. I should have looked at it sooner, because it didn’t quite match up with my current healthy day plan. Blah again! It took a bit to get it working right. Honestly, looking at my last blood sugar reading, it still needs a bit of tweaking.

Looking for information on how to make your own sick day plan? Talk to your health care team. Also, here are some good links:

Software, part 2

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A sad faceI’ve been using the OneTouch Software. It is pretty easy to use, but it has one frustrating thing…every once in a while it is looking for a .msi file. I think, for some reason, it is trying to install something. My guess is that it has something to do with sound, because it is looking for a particular sound .msi file. But, that file isn’t on my hard drive, so every few minutes it looks for it again. I didn’t remember the software before, but I do now… I remember the last time I had OneTouch it did the same darn thing. And I was just as annoyed with it. In fact, I am pretty sure this is why I stopped using it years ago. Sigh, it has been years since I used OneTouch…you would figure it would be fixed by now.

Does anyone else have the same problem with this software? Did you manage to fix it?

One Touch Software

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One Touch software CD and the USB cableThe OneTouch software finally arrived in the mail. I used InTouch a while ago, but I couldn’t remember if I used OneTouch. If I did, it was on the computer that died.

It was pretty easy to install and my numbers were downloaded around 15 minutes later.

But, do you know what I noticed after I saw the ugly report page — red…lots of red, and quite a few yellows. For those who don’t have the software, that shows highs and hypos. It seems my diabetic control is much worse than I thought…Ugh.

I guess it proves that I need to stay on top of my numbers more. Sigh…