Glucose monitor
The blood glucose meter is an important instrument to measure the glucose containing information in the blood of a human body or an animal body, especially for one suffering from diabetes. The detection and measurement of glucose in body fluids, such as blood, urine and cerebro-spinal fluid, provides information crucial to a proper assessment of the functions of the body. Glucose is a basic organic compound found in living organisms, food, and chemical products. Diabetes mellitus is the most common of endocrine disorders, and is characterized by inadequate insulin action. Diabetes mellitus has two principal variants, known as Type I diabetes and Type II diabetes. Glucose monitoring is a fact of everyday life for diabetic individuals. To accommodate a normal life style to the need for frequent monitoring of glucose levels, a number of glucose meters are now available which permit the individual to test the glucose level in a small amount of blood. The success of these devices, however, depends on the ability of the user to obtain a correct reading. Typical methods of determining the concentration of glucose in a sample, such as blood, fall into the categories of aromatic amine methods, enzymatic methods, oxidation methods, and most recently, infrared reflection and absorption spectroscopy. Glucose monitoring of the blood ordinarily requires that a small amount of blood be drawn from the body. Each time the skin of the body is penetrated to draw the blood, there is a risk of infection in addition to an associated buildup of scar tissue. In addition, considerable time is expended in drawing, processing and testing the blood. Non-invasive measurement of blood glucose concentration offers many advantages over invasive measurements, since the intermittent tests, which are widely practiced by diabetic patients, involve pain and discomfort from frequent finger-pricking. In recent years there has been an enormous growth of monitoring blood glucose in the home. Home glucose monitoring is an attempt to institute cybernetic control in the management of diabetes. In theory, patients monitor their blood glucose multiple times a day and record this information in log books. The information is then used by the patient's physician to periodically adjust the dosage of insulin or other therapeutic agent.
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