So, in cases of hypo, it’s always important to double check your blood sugar via a finger prick test just to be sure, and if you feel like something isn’t right, then test with your finger too. This means it doesn’t come from an actual blood sugar, which can mean there is a 15-minute delay from what the reading on your Freestyle Libre is and the reading from an actual blood sugar prick from a monitor. The glucose reading comes from the interstitial fluid (ISF), a thin layer of fluid that surrounds the cells of the tissues below your skin. In the USA and UK this warming up period for the libre sensor is 1 hour for all 14 day sensors. This allows you to make adjustments to your diabetic care (alongside the advice of your team) to improve your quality of blood sugars and therefore the quality of life.īefore you can use your sensor it has a “warming up” period. There are occasions it will provide you with false information, especially within the first few hours of using it whilst its adjusting.Īll the data that the Freestyle Libre sensor provides you with can be used to gain insights into your routine blood sugars via graphs, averages, and a predicted HBA1C. This is because the FreeStyle Libre Sensor is still a piece of technology that isn’t always accurate. This gives you more data than a finger prick, however, if you are in a hypo, then it’s best to double check with a finger prick. To gain a glucose reading, you simply perform a quick, 1-second scan of the reader over the sensor. How Does The FreeStyle Libre Sensor Work? Please note, that in the USA, the Freestyle Libre Sensor has the option of a 10 day sensor and now a 14 day sensor. It allows you to attempt to “catch” high and low blood sugars before they occur. This is useful if it’s been hours since you’ve taken insulin, or you are on a low number and are about to take part in some form of physical activity. This trend indicates whether your glucose may rise, go down, or stay steady. When you move the reader over the sensor, it shows up a current glucose reading and the last eight hours of data as well as a trend arrow. This is a handheld reader (as shown below) that shows your glucose readings and can store the data for up to 90 days, which gives you the chance to analyze patterns and trends. The FreeStyle Libre System has two main pieces. (two stacked quarters in the USA) The sensor lasts up to fourteen days. This is all achieved by wearing a sensor on your arm, which is the size of a two pound (UK) coin. This reduces the need for countless finger pricks and the system can indicate via a graph whether your blood sugar is rising, dropping or heading steadily. What this basically means is that the FreeStyle Libre is a system that allows you to “scan” your blood sugar using either a reader or an app on a smartphone. So, to take an official quote from the Abbot website: “The FreeStyle Libre flash glucose monitoring system is the first product in the flash glucose monitoring category and is designed to liberate people with diabetes from many of the hassles of glucose monitoring, such as routine finger pricking.” Some of you may have already heard of the FreeStyle Libre Sensor, others may not. What is the FreeStyle Libre Sensor and System?
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