Meter Inaccuracy & $$ Savings on Test Strips

[nutritiongirl22]

Hi Everyone!

I know there are a lot of posts out there about which meters are reliable for kitties and pros/cons for each. My kitty just went in for his first curve today and I was in shock by how off my meter was. On the advice of my diabetic boyfriend, I bought the CVS True2go meter. He said this one had good reviews and was inexpensive. I'd checked 007's blood sugar 4 times in the past week and his values ranged 160-186. It just didn't make sense. His blood sugar from diagnosis at the lab had been 416 one of those same days.

Today I compared our vet Accu-chek Aviva to mine side by side, same blood drop. The Aviva was 316 and the True2go was 157. On me, the Aviva was 98 and True2go was 92. I suspected it was inaccurate - something was not making sense - but how inaccurate it was shocked me. Since I work at a vet, I did his urinalysis myself so I also knew how much glucose he was spilling in his urine.

I have looked at everyone's recommendations and it looks like a lot of people have ReliOn meters and strips because they are very cost-effective. I've also gotten the recommendation from my vet to purchase an Accu-chek meter. I jumped the gun and bought one at Wal-mart tonight for $25, opened it up and the 2 bottles of test strips had been swiped from the starter pack. So I got online to look at pricing and found that you can get a FREE Accu-chek Nano starter pack by printing out a coupon online and having a prescription for the meter. https://www.accu-chek.com/microsites/nano/offer.html?source=microsite Inside the box is a savings card that will give you a discount on the test strips. All you need is a prescription for the strips and the card at the pharmacy and you can get $20 off each pack of 50, $40 off each pack of 100 if you don't have insurance. https://www.accu-chek.com/connect/ Even with that, the strips are still quite pricey. I'm not planning on checking his blood sugar more than a few times a week max, hopefully very rarely once we've got him on a stable regimen. He's got enough poking to deal with and the last thing I need is to stress him into even higher blood sugars and asthma attacks.

My questions for you:
1. ReliOn users with Accu-cheks, have you compared your meters simultaneously? Have you found them to be comparable?
2. Have the Accu-chek test strips gone up in price in recent years? Just curious...seems like people were saying they were more like $1 a strip and they're up from that unless you buy them online now.
3. Anyone have any other thoughts to share, etc on this topic?

Thanks!

 

[Larry and Kitties]

Previously users have reported that meter with "True" in the title seem to be very inaccurate when used on cats but can still be accurate for humans. That is because of how a specific meter measure/reports the BG value.

 

[Shelly & Jersey (GA)]

Good morning!

Pet-specific meters definitely read higher than human meters, but we take that into consideration here. For instance, we consider "normal" on a human meter to be about 50 to 120 for our cats. On the AlphaTrak, normal is considered to be about 68 to around 160. From some of the most recent information I've read, the AT may read about 30 to 40% higher than a human meter.

Don't know if that's the type of information you were looking for, but hope it helps!
Shelly

 

[Larry and Kitties]

Blood Glucose Meter for Cats
Facts:
Blood has two constituents, the red and white blood cells and the liquid (serum). Blood plasma is blood serum without the clotting factor
The blood glucose value obtained via laboratory analysis is the glucose level in the serum/plasma constituents of blood
The glucose is in both the serum and red-blood cells (RBC) themselves. However, the distribution of glucose is different between humans and cats (and dog too)1
In Humans 58% is in plasma/serum and 42% in RBCs
In cats 93% is in plasma/serum and 7% in RBCs
In dogs 87.5 % in plasma/serum and 12.5% in RBCs.
The point-of-use blood glucose meters (the ones we use at home) all use whole blood.2 However, what specific blood glucose they measure varies with the manufacturer. Some manufacturers only measure the glucose in the serum/plasma. Others lyse (disrupt the cell walls of the RBCs) and thus mix the glucose that was in the RBC into the liquid and thus measure total glucose. The meters then correct/adjust the reading to be equivalent to human blood plasma
Discussion:
Since the glucose distribution is different n humans and cats/dogs the resulting BG valve obtained from the human meters will be different that lab values and animal-calibrated meters. Also, some manufacturer's meters will be much different that lab values for animals depending upon which method (lyse cells or only use plasma/serum) they use to measure glucose.

Animal calibrated meters correct the value to be equivalent to lab values.

What clouds any BGs obtained from hand-held meter is that they are only accurate to +/- 20 %. That includes the animal-calibrated meter. Also, do not confuse accuracy with reproducibility. It is expected that one meter with one lot of tests strips to be relatively repeatable, that is if you use the same drop of blood, you BG value will be much close than +/- 20%

References:
1. WHY DO YOU NEED A SPECIES SPECIFIC METER?
2. Glucose Meters: A Review of Technical Challenges to Obtaining Accurate Results

 

[KPassa]

I started out using an Accu-Chek Nano but the strips were just so costly! I first switched to the ReliOn Micro and compared them side-by-side for a week. The numbers were either exactly the same or only off by one or two points. Eventually. I switched to the ReliOn Prime (the strips are the cheapest at $0.18 a piece) and compared that with my ReliOn Micro. The Prime was "off" +/-20 to 30 points, however, I also discovered the Prime was more accurate at lower numbers (my non-diabetic consistently tests in the 30s on the Micro but in the 40s and 50s on the Prime). In higher numbers, the Micro seems more accurate.

I like either meter and would suggest the Micro/Confirm for when you're first starting out and figuring out what all the numbers mean and gathering data. After that, switching to the Prime (which also requires a tab more blood than the Micro) won't make much noticeable difference in the scheme of things.

 

[nutritiongirl22]

Thank you for explaining that! It makes a lot of sense now why the meters would test differently. Now I feel silly but I don't think I realized that "true" meters were just ones with "true" in the title. I was like, what is a "true" meter?

I think I will take your suggestion on the ReliOn meters. Thank you for the tips on the different types. That's what's tough - is going into the store and seeing how many there are. I recognized some of them but I didn't want to pick one based on price alone, especially after such a bad experience. Right now I really want a meter that can give me a decent high reading so that I can do home glucose curves. I know there are always going to be some variability in the meters but knowing he's in the 200s and 300s versus half that is important.

 

[BJM]

From some of the most recent information I've read, the AT may read about 30 to 40% higher than a human meter.

The math is the other way around.

Human meters read 30-40% lower than pet specific meters.
pet meter estimate from human meter = human meter / 0.65
human meter estimate from pet meter = pet meter * 0.65

To show you:
human meter of 100 * 1.35 = 135
vs
human meter of 100 / 0.65 = 153.8