I saw a great advertisement for an insurance company, while traveling recently. It went like this: “Technology when you want it. People when you don’t.” (trademark: Esurance Insurance Company). I was immediately reminded of people with diabetes and all the fancy technology that’s available for downloading meters and insulin pumps, creating charts and logs and graphs and more. There was a discussion on another diabetes blog (diabetesmine) not too long ago, about phone apps for diabetes management. Many people who commented said they like gadgets and gizmos (technology) that help them “manage” their diabetes. In truth, technology doesn’t help us manage our diabetes, but can certainly help us organize information and make choices/decisions about our diabetes management.
Other people commented that they like the good, old-fashioned method of writing blood glucose readings in a log book. The nice thing about this approach is that it’s very easy to look for patterns. Health care professionals love it when patients bring a log book full of numbers with dates and times (in order, preferably) to appointments. Suggestions for adjustments to medications, food choices and exercise (amount or timing) can be made based on patterns that show up.
I commented that I used to faithfully record every blood glucose reading. I also used multiple meters (one at work, one in the car, one at home, etc.) Then I started seeing an endocrinologist whose office uses meter downloading software. I discovered that it was much more helpful to download one meter and see all the fancy graphs, charts, etc., than to see fragments of data from several meters on several printouts. I quickly changed to using one meter and never writing down blood glucose readings again (to date). When I’m working with a patient, I encourage them to write down their readings. I also let them know about the software that’s available. I will have to start telling them about phone apps as well, although the people who are likely to use phone apps will probably already have them on their phones before they ever meet me!
Which approach do you take? Do you use technology to assist you in managing your diabetes? Do you write down your numbers?