The Continuous Sensor
 

Has anyone ever heard of it? It goes along with the minimed insulin pump. I have it and want to know what other people think about it.
I decided that I like it, but it can be a pain. I don't like callibrating the sensor and then having it tell you that your callibration is incorrect.
I just want to see what others thought.

You threw me for a loop for a minute. I was not sure, at first, that you were talking about a Continuous "blood" Glucose Monitor (CGM). I have not seen it talked about much on the forum, but there is one blogger using it. You might find some information there. Here is one of his Dexcom posts.

Ok thanks! Yeah the one I am talking about doesn't actually test your blood... But anyways I'll check that out!

The CGM doesn't take readings from your blood but from interstitial fluid. I have been using one for about a month now. It was very frustrating in the beginning but is getting better now that I'm a little more used to what it does. It lags behind what your finger stick will tell you but it is good to notice trends. When you are going up or down very quickly it can't quite keep up so I've dropped pretty low without it realizing and alarming me. So far I like it and am hoping it can help me get my A1C down to 6 or lower.

Yes, that's the one I was thinking of. I've been using mine for mre than a year now. I have to say that it does become a habbit to just rely of the sensor, but I know I can't do that because it is about 10 minutes behind what your blood sugars really are. Anyways, thanks to the sensor, I got my A1C down to 6.6 . A lot better then I had expected!

If you are using the insulin pump, does that mean you'll have to have 2 sites in at once? One for the insulin and one for the tester?

Yes, you have to have 2 sites. I wear one on my arm and on on my hip. You can wear either one wherever you want.

Been using the Continous monitor for 4 months now. Minimed brand. Don't use their pump, I am using the omnipod, since April 2010. Still getting used to all of it. Love the monitor, but it does lag behind when your sugar is moving up or down rapidly. Been type 1 since 1983, no complications so far, A1c generally runs around 7

The CGM is really easy to use. Ive had it for about three months.

I've used Medtronic CGM for several years but now Medicare nor Tri-care will pay for the very My insurance will no longer cover the very expensive sets. I needed it for very severe lows at first but now I'm pretty much "flat-lining on my pump and not worth the $$. It's a great tool, however.

Hey! I dno if uv goten enough replies to this or not but i have used the cgm sensor for the medtronic paradigm 722 model and found it great. You are right it is annoying very annoying! Wen the callibration doesnt work or when the pump doesnt pick up the sensor, but wen it does work its great for controlling and seeing where your Bgl is at.
Although they r quite pricy!!!

I have had both the minimed Cgm and now use the Dexcom. the minimed was very frustrating cause of the lag time it most of the time was off from whatever my finger stick reading was by a good 40 to 60 points consistently. i love the dexcom cgm it is usually between 10 and 20 points off but when you take lag into consideration not too bad

I agree with the above poster. I've been on a CGM for almost 5 years now because I have hypoglycemic unawareness in my sleep and have a history of night time seizures.

I started with the Medtronic one since I was on a Medtronic pump and it was integrated. I loved it, but was annoyed with the calibration errors and the annoying "out of range" alarms since I remove my pump when I swim and would keep it by the side of the pool (but that didn't seem to make any difference). The accuracy also seemed VERY off at times, and I hated that the sensors hurt so much! Despite all of these things, it was all I knew as far as CGMs so I stayed on it for a couple of years, until....

I discovered the Dexcom CGM after seeing a buddy use hers. The separate receiver (carrying around a 2nd device) seemed annoying to me at first, but I loved that the sensors seemed more comfortable, lasted longer (7 days as opposed to Medtronic's 4 days, AND you can usually get at least 10 days out of a Dexcom sensor) and perhaps best of all, the receiver doesn't go nuts when it's out of range - the alarms are completely customize-able!

I've been on the Dexcom CGM for the last 3 years or so and find all of the above to be great, PLUS it's WAY more accurate than Medtronic's. There's just no comparison. I don't mind the separate receiver - it's actually helpful because I velcro it to my handlebars when I'm on long rides and can see my BG in "real time" and take in carbs/give insulin accordingly.

Dexcom has come out with their G4 recently and it is WAY cooler looking - the transmitters are a little larger/thicker, but the receivers are very cool - they look like an iPod and come in cool colors. Plus, it's supposed to be up to 30% even MORE accurate. I can't wait to upgrade in April :)

So I read above that it doesn't check blood glucose but checks interstitial fluid glucose...how soon after taking a bite of food will your levels rise?

edited to add: my real question is-(or another question I'm curious about) how soon after taking a bite of food (and thus stimulating your liver to dump) will a bg reading rise?

I think technically the lag can be 20 minutes or so, but in my experience it's more like 10 minutes (important to note, it's not constant, it sends data every 5 minutes), and of course depends on what the glycemic index is, how much fat/protein, stuff like that. If you check out a receiver, it's more useful for seeing trends over 3+ hours. there's a screen that shows you trends over 1hr, over 3hrs, over 6hrs, 12hrs and 24hrs. I find the 3 and 6hr trends to be most helpful. It's not to take the place of your meter, just another useful tool. :)