? Glucometer recommendations?

As the title states. Preferably looking for one that requires the least amount of blood. I’ve been looking at previous posts from a few years ago for suggestions, but I can’t seem to find the glucometers that were being recommended like the Relion Confirm, Relion Micro, or Glucometer Elite. They don't seem to be in stock online, so I’m not sure if they’re being sold anymore.

The AlphaTRAK seems good, but I’ve heard that pet-specific glucometers aren’t really necessary and the test strips for the AlphaTRAK are pretty expensive. I’m willing to spend the money if it’s that good, but if there’s another glucometer that’s just as effective/easy to use for less money I would obviously prefer that over the AlphaTRAK.

 

ReliOn Prime is what Walmart has now and I’ve been using it for a few months. It requires a bit more blood .5 as opposed to .3 but I can honestly say I’ve not had any issues getting enough blood on it. I think the fact that the strip pulls the blood in helps a lot and even when I think I don’t have enough it works. It’s certainly the one with the most affordable strips and lots of folks here use it. The other option is Freestyle lite which I also used. It only requires .3 like pet meters and the strips are less expensive than alphatrack but still more than ReliOn. Even though it requires less blood, I had more issues and “errors” with freestyle but it’s smaller and it does beep when it’s got the result. Just to give you an idea I can get 100 ReliOn strips for $17.99 when 100 freestyle strips will cost around $56. The website I found that had the best price for those is affordable diabetic and you can use a promo code to get 5% off SAVE5 or sign up for autoship. I hope my review helps!

 

Just want to add that you do not need to spend the extra money for a pet meter. It’s not any better really. It’s just marketed that way and when we’re interpreting the spreadsheet numbers it’s always based on human meter numbers fyi

 

The relion micro and confirm are both discontinued unfortunately. The Prime is what a lot of people use now instead, as Ale has recommended. It works well for me

 

we've just switched from alphatrak2 (AT2) to relion prime. the main two reasons for our switch were

• a lot people here use human meter so it's easier to communicate around the numbers and
• cost was really adding up on AT2.

with that said, i actually get more frequent errors with the relion, but i attribute that to my being used to needing less blood from the time w AT2 and moving away too soon. also, i find it easier to handle the AT2. it just fits better in my hand and i can get the strip in one-handed. i'm pretty sure that if i'd never used the AT2 that i would not think at all about the difference in ergonomics between the two meters.

summing it up:
if we hadn't had a vet recommendation for the AT2 in the early weeks and had known about this community, we probably would have gone straight to a human meter with reasonably priced strips that we can get at pretty much any time of the day or night from walmart ...

hth, ^jw

 

The ReliOn is definitely bulkier but I was never able to do it one handed kudos to you! I’m wondering, are you trying to scoop up the blood like you did before? The freestyle strips look exactly like the alphatrack ones and I know when I do that it doesn’t work. I kinda love how I can just make the strip touch the edge of the blood droplet and it literally sucks it in. I always had to do this sideways with freestyle because of the strip design and with ReliOn I can just aim it forward

 

hmmm good question. i’ll pay more attention this PMPS. i know at first i was *definitely* holding the relion wrong wrt to how it wicks, i.e. forward vs side.

i also find the strip push entry on the relion “stiffer” than the at2. if that makes any sense?

oh. and. other great feature of the relion is no codes! the first time we finished a container of at2 strips we completely forget to change the code on the meter. for literally days. we were nearly in tears when we realized bc we thought all the data was useless. we got lucky tho bc we called the company and since the old code was close to the new code, they claimed the reading differences wouldn’t be significant.

 

I agree with you the push entry for the strips is a bit stiffer, but I’ve gotten used to it now.

I have news for you no codes for either human meter. ReliOn or freestyle

 

I personally like the alpha and have used it for four years. The strips are pricy but I like having the same readings as my vet. I very rarely get an error message as it needs a super small drop. It's my personal preference.

 

I have never got an error with the Relion Prime

 

I did yesterday but I knew it was too little blood and just thought let me give it a try anyway. But the other thing I like about the Relion is that you can see the blood fill the strip and it it doesn’t fill the chip area, you know it won’t read which is exactly what happened to me yesterday. Also, as you test more and more you get used to knowing visually if you have enough blood on the ear or not.

 

Exactly Ale kisses for Minnie and hugs for you have a good day Ale

 

No Relion here, not sold in Canada but i've been comparing tests between Alphatrak2 and freestyle lite, both strips and meters. The human meter does have a huge difference. the alpha with FS strips is almost spot on

 

You can’t compare the numbers from a pet meter with a human meter. They’re always going to be different that’s why you have to convert the pet meter numbers for the ss. You can only compare human to human meter. Otherwise, it’s like apples and oranges