Two diff meters=two diff numbers

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Permalink Reply by David Lamb on April 11, 2008 at 10:31am

My experience with Accu-Chek Avivas is that the 3 I've used have all read seriously high. 2 of them were in my doctor's office, and the 3rd was one I obtained for myself when my doctor wouldn't believe that her meters were way too high. I even went so far as to bring in 5 different meters of my own and let her pick which one I would use to compare to her Aviva meter. When I got my own Aviva meter to satisfy my curiosity, it was almost 20% high against a lab calibration. Too bad because I really like the strips (good for big hands, and great blood take up) but I'll never use an Aviva meter again.

The best way to calibrate your meter is to take it with you when you get you labs done and take a few readings when the lab tech draws blood for a lab blood glucose test.

My OneTouch Mini seems to be very accurate against lab tests, as have all of my other OneTouch meters (InDuo, Ultra, Ultra 2, and UltraSmart).

I suggest you calibrate both of your meters against a lab test, but I'll bet that the Aviva will be high. Let us know what you find. Maybe I just had bad luck 3 times in a row, but I doubt it. Is there anyone out there who has lab calibrated an Aviva meter and found it to be accurate?

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Permalink Reply by Bugoy on November 9, 2008 at 7:44pm

Welcome to the zany world of meter readings!

A lot of questions about different readings between different meters has been thrown into the air but
nobody has found an answer yet.

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Permalink Reply by Will Johnson on November 15, 2008 at 4:47pm

The meters can be a 20% difference and still be considered accurrate. Using the same meter and testing the same blood sample twice will result in 2 different readings.

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Permalink Reply by Kathy on November 15, 2008 at 5:20pm

Don't do that. You will drive yourself nuts!
Just stick with one meter, and use control solution. That's all you can do.
I went through a period (somewhat short, due to the cost) where I tested using two meters and concluded that the results would never be the same, so what's the use.

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Permalink Reply by richielj on November 22, 2008 at 8:44am

I agree completely. Tried this myself with the Ascencia Contour and Breeze2. My fingers were so sore before I decided to call it off!

One big problem with the meters is that there is a +/- 20% error margin which accounts for most of the differences mentioned here. I guess drawing the blood is fairly complicated (at least according to the Bayer technicians I spoke with).

I just use my meter (now using the OneTouch Ultra2 due to insurance restrictions) to see what foods increase my bg levels to unacceptable highs. I met with my diabetes nutrition counselor this week and she told me that since my A1c is good (5.6) that I no longer need to test before and after meals --just test at random times once or twice a day to see what's going. So far I haven't had any surprises but I'm happy to test just once daily.

BTW, the Ultra2 is ~10 points lower than my Contour...

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Permalink Reply by Jenny on November 22, 2008 at 10:59am

Trust the OneTouch.

I had an Aviva for a few months. Some boxes of strips gave very high readings. Some were okay. When I took it to the lab it was reading 40 mg/dl over what the lab reported. I threw it away.

I have had 3 different One Touches and they usually match each other within 5 mg/dl. They always read a bit lower than Accucheks even when the Accucheks are behaving, but they are consistant, and that's what you need in a meter.

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Permalink Reply by Anthony Holko on December 12, 2008 at 3:23pm

The problem with all the modern meters is that the measurement time is much too fast usually 5 seconds. When I first developped diabetes 11 years ago I got a Bayer Ascentia I think is was called. I took 60 seconds to get a reading but the up side was that is was ALWAYS 5% lower than the lab test, unbelievably accurate. In this case progress was a disaster. 20% error is horrible the more so if it is on both sides of the true value.

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