What is continuous glucose monitoring?
Endocrinologist John Merendino, MD, explains what kind of system continuous glucose monitoring refers to, how it works, and why it's important.
Transcript
Continuous glucose monitoring refers to a system which would measure the blood sugar
levels in your body round the clock 24 hours a day. And these systems have become available
since about the mid-2000s. And they're getting better all the time. They presently require that a catheter
be inserted through the skin into the fat under the skin. And the glucose level is measured
in the fluid between the fat cells in exactly the way that the glucose would be measured in a drop of blood when you do a fingerstick.
But that chemical reaction which tells you what the glucose is is being done all the time. And you have a receiver which tells you
what the glucose level is every five minutes through the day. Now, the advantage for many people is not only knowing what their sugar is
but also knowing the direction in which they're heading and how fast they're heading there. So very frequently, if your blood sugar is heading down
rapidly, you wouldn't know that if you didn't test yourself or if you only did a one point in time blood sugar.
But if you've got the continuous glucose monitor, it can tell you that the glucose is dropping quickly. And you'll know that you can intervene.
The other place that these things are incredibly valuable is for individuals who don't perceive the symptoms
of a low blood sugar. We call this hypoglycemic unawareness. And if you don't feel it when your blood sugar is going low,
then you risk losing consciousness, for example, with no warning.
living with diabetes
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