What a difference a day makes (Dexcom trial continued)

Sunday was a really trying day with the Dexcom. In the middle of the morning, the Dexcom decided that my blood sugars were rising - fast.

I tested and they were on the high side, but the values were actually stabilized. Now I was at church without the large cable, so I couldn't synchronize the meter and the Dexcom receiver. So I watched the Dexcom values climb through the 300s until it just said HI, meaning over 400.

Once I got home I did the synchronization and the Dexcom responded with an X, meaning that the system was out of calibration. I tried calibrating several time and even reset the sensor. I never got another reading out of the Dexcom for the rest of the day on Sunday.

I e-mailed the representative and she mentioned that taking some medications such as acetaminophen can cause problems. I had taken some that morning and that may have been the cause of the problem. Unfortunately this was not something that was mentioned during the training on Friday.

So on Monday I put on my second (and last) sensor. This time I did it after showering so that wouldn't cause problems. And it's been working really well ever since.

I'm hoping that it will last until Friday.

It looks as if I can't get the software before this Friday. This makes it very hard for me to evaluate the overall system. So I'll probably spend most of my visit on Friday experimenting with the software itself.

I decided to change the High and Low settings on the receiver to 180 mg/dL and 90 mg/dL respectively. This way the receiver will buzz me before I hit levels that concern me. This will give me more time to take corrective action.

One thing that I've found from wearing the Dexcom for just a few days is that my dawn phenomenon starts to kick in around 3:30 AM. This is much earlier than I ever expected.

So I've adjusted my basal rate to start 30 minutes earlier and give me an extra 0.5 units at that time. I'm taking it very slowly so I don't end up over-correcting. Here's hoping that tomorrow morning I remain under 180!

I guess my summary for today is. When this thing works it's fairly good. I like the results and the visualization, they're very powerful. I don't like the packaging, the user interface, the loooooooooong cable, the need to use 2 glucose meters. When it doesn't work it's incredibly frustrating, especially because the sensors are $35 each.

Labels: CGM, Dexcom, experience

posted by Bernard @ 6:45 PM