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Blood Glucose meters help people with diabetes check their blood sugar at home, school, work, and play. The glucose meters can unintentionally be switched from one unit of measurement to another, resulting in an inaccurate blood glucose interpretation by the user. Users in the United States were warned that their meter reading is displayed as mg/dL because an inaccurate reading can lead to taking the wrong dose of insulin or dietary changes, resulting in higher levels of sugar in the blood or hyperglycemia.

At least 25 different blood glucose meters are commercially available. Glucose meters must be reliable because if diabetes is not well-controlled, complications such as kidney failure, amputations, and blindness can occur. They differ in several ways including: Amount of blood needed for each test, testing speed, overall size, ability to store test results in memory, cost of the meter, cost of the test strips used.

What to look for when buying a Blood Glucose Meter

Testing area: Some blood glucose meters allow you to test on your finger, forearm or palm.

Sample size: (A blood glucose meter may need between .3 and 1.5 micro-liters of blood)

Speed: Some blood glucose meters give results in 5 seconds.

Ease of Use

Before and after mean averages: Some blood glucose meters can give you a before and after meal averages.

Suitability for use by children under ten years old: Young kids may have a hard time opening foil-wrapped strips and often forget to write down the results. Meters that require smaller blood volumes are more suitable for young kids than meters that require larger blood volumes.

Suitability for use by children over ten years old: Older kids can take on the foil-wrapped strips and meters that require more blood. Meters lacking a data port require the user to write everything down, which some people forget.