Diabetes Blog – Happy-Medium.net

The photo you see above is indicative of something I do every day.

As part of the clinical trial I’m participating in, I have to log onto a website every day (or every other day) and enter information related to my diabetes. I also have to upload Dexcom data for each day.

What you see in the photo is from two different days. One of those was a day with a sensor change, and a comedown from a high caused by insulin that went bad overnight (both on the second day). I use some shorthand for what I need to enter. Putting this down on paper ahead of time makes it easier once I log in to do the entry. Let me break it down for you:

On the left side, you can see the times that I’m doing finger sticks each day. Next to that is the blood glucose reading (in milligrams per deciliter, or mg/dL). Since almost all of the readings are from times when I’m eating something (three meals plus a snack at night on these two days), you’ll see the insulin bolus I’m administering next to the BG number (it’s the 4.0, 3.1, etc. on the photo). The difference was on the second day, when I did the fingersticks for calibration of the new Dexcom sensor at 8:58 and 9:18. The 9:18 fingerstick was followed up by a small 1.5 unit correction bolus. Finally, there’s the code I’m using to note what kind of meal or snack I’m having. The meals are noted as small, medium, or large, and either high carb (HC), high fat (HF), high carb and high fat (HCF), and neither high carb nor high fat (N/A).

This isn’t all of the data that gets entered. I’m also entering information about exercise and how I’m feeling that day, plus a couple of other things. All of the daily data that is entered is used by the site to help guide me toward making good choices to help manage my diabetes better. Every so often, we’re prompted to learn various things about our diabetes through core studies created by the study’s team.

I’ve started keeping all of these little sheets of paper with my daily data on it. Right now, looking at this information in its simplest form really makes me cringe about how I’m going through my day. I mean, those aren’t great numbers there. My A1c is good, but I’m anything but proud of what this shows me. These are a couple of not-so-great days, for various reasons. I’ve had much better ones, but I still don’t have any great excuses. Maybe keeping everything and looking back on it will make me consider what to do to be better in the future. At the very least it will keep me from ignoring it.

The requirement is for me to enter daily data at least five out of every seven days to continue my participation in the study. We originally started the study in April. Then we took a break, and started again in late May. Getting everything down in simple form in one place has made doing this every day for five weeks a little easier.

Now I’m starting to really think about what all of these numbers really mean, and what to do about them.