Re: [IP] Meter Accuracy
> ------------------------------
>
> Date: Wed, 02 May 2012 20:52:12 -0500
> From: Denise <email @ redacted>
> Subject: Re: [IP] Meter Accuracy
>
> The big glucose meters that are used on hospital floors have to be
> calibrated periodically. When I was in the hospital for barfing, the
> nurses did their AccuCheck and it was 60 points lower than what I got on
> the One Touch remote.
>
> Calibration is done by using standard solutions similar to the control
> solutions that we use.
>
> Denise B.
>
Denise,
I wouldn't assume that any measuring device used in a hospital gives accurate
results. About 2007 (age 77) I was hospitalized for four days following surgical
repair of a broken ankle. My blood pressure measured before going to the
hospital was typically about 124/68, occasionally going as high as 132/74 or so;
sometimes it was 120/64 or even a bit lower. [I was taking 20 mg daily of the
ACE inhibitor lisinopril, prescribed ten years earlier as a protective measure
against possible diabetic nephropathy -- I didn't really know what my BP would
have been without the lisinopril.]
After the operation, I had a discussion with the hospitalist who wanted me to
use an alternative ACE inhibitor that was on the hospital's formulary
(lisinopril was not), but he finally allowed me to continue using my own supply
of lisinopril brought from home. (He also wanted me to change my brand of
insulin and statin drug, but I objected strongly and was allowed to continue
with what I had been using at home.)
In the hospital my BP was measured four times a day with an automatic machine.
I was surprised that the result with that machine was always about 145/80 the
first day and climbed a bit higher on the second day. By the third day, when the
anesthetic administered during the operation had presumably been cleared out of
my body, my BP was going still higher. The hospitalist tripled my dose of
lisinopril. That night my BP went above 165!
I was getting suspicious of that machine and questioned the nurses about when
it had last been calibrated. They assured me that like all devices in the
hospital, it was tested on a regular schedule and could be trusted. However,
later I politely asked the nurse to measure my BP the old-fashioned way (arm
cuff inflated by the nurse, who listened with a stethoscope). She came out with
124 just after the machine reported 165! The next day the hospitalist ordered
that my BP be measured manually and he cut my daily lisinopril back to 20 mg.
I hate to think what could have happened to me had I been unconscious for an
extended period. One of my greatest fears these days is that I might some day
end up in a hospital, unable to discuss my treatment with the doctor and unable
to continue my own medications that I know I can tolerate.
Mel Halbert
.
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