Glucometer is a medical device that helps to measure the approximate concentration of glucose level in the blood. A small prick over finger (ring finger, commonly used) and a small drop of blood gives blood sugar readings. Even in spite of its ease of utility, it has several drawbacks and errors. One of the major drawbacks is inaccuracy.
There are several reasons that could give you inaccurate or higher readings on a glucometer:
–Unclean hands may give inaccurate results.
–Unclean meter or touching the sensor with bare hands while testing can give higher readings.
-All glucometers require optimal temperature to work, if there is difference in temperature between optimal temperature and temperature while operating the device, there will be alteration of the readings.
-If the blood drop is insufficient to give the results or if too much of blood is used.
-If you are using different meters every time, as different meters will have different error percentile.
Apart from this, even with all the care,there is certain percentile difference, and this difference is attributed to different collection patterns of blood. The blood used for lab testing is venous blood, while the blood used in glucometer is capillary blood and there is a difference in glucose level of venous blood and capillary blood. Thus, readings from glucometer vary from that of laboratory reading. In this case, you should rely on the results from lab since they are performed more accurately.