PT Health Life – Self-monitoring of blood sugar helps patients better understand the relationship between blood sugar levels and diet, exercise, and medication to take appropriate action.
1. How to measure blood sugar at home will be carried out through the following steps:
• Step 1 : Wash hands with water and soap and dry thoroughly. Fingertips can be wiped with alcohol. You need to keep your hands dry before injecting blood .
• Step 2 : Place the needle tip into the needle holder.
• Step 3 : Remove the test strip from the box, and immediately close the box again, to prevent the strip from getting wet because it absorbs water vapor in the air. Do not use test strips from cracked or expired bottles.
• Step 4 : Start injecting blood. You should prick right next to the finger, don’t prick the tip of the finger because it will take very little blood and make you feel more pain.
• Step 5 : Put a drop of blood on the main point of the test strip. Some machines allow you to place the strip into the machine before administering the blood drop.
• Step 6: Place a clean cotton pad on your hand where you just pricked to stop the bleeding. Insert the test strip into the machine, wait a moment to read and record the results as well as the blood test time to clearly know the blood sugar level for the day.
• Step 7 : Keep a blood sugar monitoring diary.
However, in some special conditions such as elderly patients, comorbidities, poor consciousness, the recommended blood sugar values may change and will be advised by the physician on a case-by-case basis. When blood sugar values are outside the recommended target, patients need to seek medical advice and simple treatment of hypoglycemia to avoid the effects of hypoglycemia complications.
Besides, there are many factors that affect the accuracy of home blood glucose monitoring: test strip type, machine and operation. Therefore, patients should occasionally bring the device to the laboratory for testing to evaluate the accuracy of the device.

Diabetes is one of the most common and very dangerous diseases. The disease often progresses silently, and by the time external manifestations appear, it is often severe. Diabetes is also a major cause of blindness, kidney failure, heart attack, stroke and lower limb amputation.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), diabetes is among the 10 leading causes of death in the world in 2020. Currently, Vietnam has about 5.3 million people with pre-diabetes and an estimated 50 % of these will turn into diabetes within 10 years.
Currently, diabetes treatment includes three main pillars: diet, exercise and medication. To prevent the rise of diabetes, the entire community must change their lifestyle behaviors by changing their diet and increasing their physical activity levels.
The World Diabetes Association has compiled the evidence on foods that can cause diabetes and has made 9 recommendations for a healthy diet for people in general , specifically:
1) Choose water, coffee, or tea instead of sugary, sweetened fruit juices, soft drinks, or other sugary drinks.
2) Eat at least 3 servings of vegetables per day, including green leafy vegetables.
3) Eat up to 3 servings of fresh fruit per day.
4) Choose a piece of fresh fruit, or unsweetened yogurt for a snack.
5) Limit alcoholic beverages.
6) Choose lean white meat, poultry or seafood, instead of red or processed meat.
7) Choose peanut butter instead of chocolate or jam.
8) Choose wholemeal bread, rice or pasta instead of white bread, rice or pasta.
9) Choose unsaturated fats (olive oil, canola oil, corn oil, or sunflower oil) instead of saturated fats (butter, animal fats, coconut oil, or palm oil)