CONTOUR® blood glucose monitoring portfolio praised by nurses

A blood glucose monitoring portfolio consisting of a meter and an online platform has been praised by two nurses.

Sara-Louise Smith, who is a Lead Practice Nurse in Nottinghamshire, and diabetes specialist nurse Ben Keeler have applauded Ascensia Diabetes Care’s CONTOUR®PLUS BLUE connected meter and GlucoContro.online.

The CONTOUR®PLUS BLUE connected meter stores the most recent 800 blood glucose test results and provides 7, 14, 30 and 90 day averages.

Its readings are accompanied by a colour range indicator to help people with diabetes easily see if their blood glucose levels are below target, within target or above target.

In addition, the meter can also be synced to the free CONTOUR®DIABETES app which means people living with diabetes can see all their blood glucose readings in an electronic diary on their phone.

GlucoContro.online is a secure platform that allows healthcare professionals to access personalised data about registered patients such as target ranges and time frames.

For healthcare professionals, GlucoContro.online also offers a panel showing general statistics, a complete list of their registered patients and the ability to easily generate reports, including ambulatory glucose profiles (AGP) featuring glucose statistics, a summary glucose profile and daily glucose graphs.

Sara-Louise describes the CONTOUR®PLUS BLUE meter and its associated technologies as her “first line, preferred option” for people living with diabetes.

She said: “With this technology we can easily see who is at greater risk or has really poor glycaemic control so we can target them for their review sooner rather than waiting.

“Having this technology is a real benefit to my practice. It allows us to show the patients their results in a much more user-friendly way.

“Its traffic light colours are more easily identifiable to patients than the numbers that only really clinicians can interpret and understand.”

She added: “We don’t always have the perfect patient who has a lovely book with all their test results. People have busy lives, they work, they have children, things get in the way. But the CONTOUR®DIABETES app shows them where they are with their blood sugars and it’s the same for us on GlucoContro.online – it shows us trends.

“The machine itself is lightweight and it’s got a really big screen whereas a lot of the other machines on the market are quite small.”

Ben says the technology enables him to quickly identify patients who are struggling with their glycaemic control.

He said: “With GlucoContro.online you can see all the results plotted in front of you on one screen. Within a few seconds you have an idea of how severe their hyperglycaemia is or how severe their hypoglycaemia is.

“From a snapshot, immediate perspective you have an idea of what is coming to clinic or what is in front of you sat there in the consultation.”

He also thinks Ascensia’s Diabetes Optimisation Toolkit compares favourably with other similar technologies.

Ben continued: “I’m impressed with the Diabetes Optimisation Toolkit. I’ve seen a few other similar medical record risk aggregation tools and what I like about Ascensia’s is that it looks at the cost effectiveness of using CONTOUR®PLUS BLUE but it is also a medical record dashboard.

“Instead of a clinician having to go through multiple different pages on a medical record it gives you a snapshot of what medications a patient is on, if they’re meeting their treatment targets in relation to glycaemia, blood pressure, lipid control, the core processes and treatment targets.”

To learn more about how Ascensia is helping healthcare professionals and people living with diabetes, visit www.diabetes.ascensia.co.uk.