Like promised I did the 3-way test of blood sugar at UCLA. I warned the nurse phlebotomist of what I was going to do, and she was intrigued and very supportive and accomodating. First I washed my hands with soap, rinsed thoroughly and air dried them - I wrapped one of the fingers of my left hand with tissue paper, so as not to contaminate it by touching anything by accident.
The nurse took me to a different station, because I asked her to leave me there for another 20 minutes after the test for me to complete all Lingo readings, that way she could continue with other patients while I was free to sit in the same place as my vein reading, and therefore there was no danger that my moving about would affect the readings. I laid out my glucose monitor and lancet next to me, with everything ready so that I can do the finger test ASAP. The nurse stuck the needle into my arm and I took a screenshot of my Lingo app reading purely out of curiosity as to how it looked 15 minutes prior. It took some 3 minutes to complete the blood draw, and during this time, every minute I took screenshots of my Lingo app reading. Immediately after the needle was pulled from my arm, I put the strip into the monitor, took off the protective tissue from my finger, obtained a blood drop and tested it - all in less than a minute after the nurse took out the needle. I obtained the reading from my Accu-Chek - it was 99. I used the Accu-Chek, because I already had several years of records using Accu-Chek and I wanted to see how much variance there was from a vein reading, so that when looking at old data, I can correct for that.
I remained in my seat, now just watching the Lingo app and taking screenshots every minute for the next 20 minutes - this way, I could see the timestamp of each reading. Fortunately for me, since I took the first reading simultaneous with the needle going into my arm, the Lingo reading oscillated around 71-74. At minute 6 after the needle was pulled from my arm, the reading climbed to 80, and then quickly declined over the next two minutes to 73. By minute 10, the Lingo was showing 72. There it stayed in the 72-74 channel for the next 5 minutes, hitting exactly 74 at minute 15. Over the following 5 minutes (taking me to 20 minutes after the needle was pulled), it stayed in a slightly broader channel of 71-74.
To sum up. My Accu-Chek showed 99 less than a minute after the needle was pulled from my arm. The Lingo showed: 72 at 10 minutes past needle being pulled out, to 74 at exactly 15 minutes, to 73 at exactly 20 minutes past needle being pulled out.
The vein fasted blood glucose reading from the lab came back as 107.
What to conclude? The Accu-Check undercounted my FBG by 8 points, so approx. 7.5% or about what the fault tolerance for the device indicated (around +/-8%). Meanwhile, the Lingo, at 15 minutes was 33 points off or about 31% fault. The readings on both sides of the 15 minutes by 5 minute margins, so 10 and 20 minutes were not substantiall different. Conclusion: the Lingo is off by some 31% in this test in my case.
Additional notes. The glucose strips and lancets for the Accu-Check were freshly purchased 2 weeks ago, and I installed a new battery. I also did a few tests on the same finger a week ago, just to see if there is consistency between the tests (about 20 seconds apart). The Lingo sensor was a new sensor I installed Saturday 10/19, carefully following instructions. The blood drawing at UCLA and the tests were on 10/23, so 4 days after the new Lingo was installed.
Conclusions. The Accu-Chek, though not exactly a star, performed within claimed margins, even though an undercounting of 7.5% is not exactly fantastic. The Abbott Lingo is dogsh|t, and I struggle to understand what way I could possibly use it that would have any value to me.
Meanwhile today I received an email from Abbott telling me that the next two sensors are on their way, as I already paid the $249 for 6 sensors, thus reminding me, as if I needed it, that I am a stone cold idiot for buying the whole package sight unseen. I should’ve bought the $49 trial and seeing the result, I’d be forewarned. But, no use crying over spilt milk. Now the question is what to do with the sensors coming. Perhaps a re-direction of the unopened package straight into the dumpster. Or, being ever the eternally optimistic fool, perhaps give the next two sensors a try, under the theory that maybe the first two were faulty. Btw. the Lingo app continues to be utter trash, no improvement over the past couple of weeks.
I can only hope that your experiences with Abbott’s OTC CGM offering is better than mine has been. All I can say, is that based on my one rat trial, it is comprehensively worthless. YMMV.
