Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Sarah K on August 16, 2012 at 6:33am

Mine is set at 70 now. I used to have the same problem and would have it at 80, but 70 works much better for me.

Permalink Reply by Brad Ringer on August 16, 2012 at 7:27am

I would say try 70 again and see what happens. Because I am hypoglycemic unaware, my CDE recommended I use 90 for my alarm. Her reasoning was that if I were trending down, taking into account the 20 minute delay of CGM, when the alarm went off I would already be around 70. (I usually don't notice symptoms until I am in the 50s or lower).

Permalink Reply by jla on August 16, 2012 at 7:40am

I use 80 because I find that the Dexcom tends to show me higher than the Omnipod Freestyle does. I use 80 for my low and 160 or 180 for my high.

Permalink Reply by Sarah K on August 16, 2012 at 8:48am

I have the opposite problem. My dex shows me lower than my PDM, usually about 10mg/dl on average.

Permalink Reply by DiabeticRadio.com on August 16, 2012 at 9:17am

To be honest, it depends for me. When I do my power walks, I like to it set at 90. The reason being is that, because I use insulin, cardio exercises can make your blood sugars lower very rapidly, so I like to have that extra cushion. However, it's been so damn hot here in NYC for the past couple of months, that I have not been wearing my Dex. :-(

Yogi
*

Permalink Reply by Phil Lindner on August 16, 2012 at 2:01pm

I've used the Dexcom for over three years. At the beginning I tried various low alarm settings and finally decided 70 worked the best. It's not too low to intervene if your BG starts to crash but is also helps avoid most of the nuisance low alarms.

Permalink Reply by MegaMinxX on August 18, 2012 at 8:32am

I have mine set to 80, but it's also important what time you have set for the 'snooze'. You mentioned times you alarmed at 78-79, and then didn't get another alarm until it hit 55. So either you were dropping fast, or you had a long snooze.

I have my snooze at 30 min for Low. This means that after the alarm at 78-79, and I acknowledge it, if 30 min later I am still under 80, it will alarm again, so I usually avoid the 55 alarm. If the snooze time is higher, it might explain why your next alarm was at 55. Times like that I wish we could set an alarm for the slanted down arrow !

I tried using 70 for my low alert, but found 80 works better for me.

Permalink Reply by Jay on August 20, 2012 at 10:20am

80 is good. Just bump it with a lifesaver candy or other small CHO to bring the the 78 to an 81. You know your body better than anyone else. Working the "trim planes" on your body is like the ones on an airplane or ship. A little goes a long way.

Permalink Reply by Mountain Biker on August 29, 2012 at 5:45pm

I must be different than the rest of the group with respect to my blood sugar swings. I leave the low alarm set at 100 since there is a 15 minute lag between the Dexcom measurement and your actual BS. If I'm dropping quickly, my actual BS could be 60 or lower when I alarm at 100. I don't mind the alarm and then I look at the trend (and often do a BS finger stick test).

Also since the Dexcom may well be off by 20 points, I don't trust the Dexcom 7 to be that accurate (hopefully its better with the Gen4).

At night I drop the low limit down to 80 to avoid being awaken without a good reason.