Testing your blood sugar is crucial for diabetics. Learn how blood sugar monitors work in this free video from a nutritionist specializing in diabetic diets.
Heidi Kaufman is a nutritionist that focuses on disorder prevention through diet. She gives lectures and teaches class at the local hospital about how to live with diabetes.
There are many different glucose monitors on the market right now. But, most of them are basically the same in certain respects. Most of them have a very small little strip that one inserts into the meter. And, then they have something called a lancet device that causes you to prick your finger with a very small amount of blood. And, then one holds the meter in one hand brings the finger up to the strip in the other when a little bit of blood is on the finger. And then that little bit of blood will be soaked up into the strip and within a couple seconds the meter will read the amount of blood sugar is in that little amount of blood. Generally, there are no meters on the market right now that are effective that will be able to read your blood without that little prick. And, I know a lot of people looking for that. But, that's not available yet. There are some meters where there is a disc of strips that you place into the meter and the meter shoots out the strip, so one doesn't have to physically put the strip in the meter. Now, that's very nice for older folks who have trouble with handling the strip. The strips tend to be very small. Anyone with dexterity problems benefits from that sort of meter. But, in general most of them have strips that must be inserted and then you check your sugar after you've done that little prick of the finger. A couple of them will allow you to prick in other places. But, the most effective areas are usually on the hands and the fingers.
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