Thursday, February 05, 2009
One hour glucose test fiasco
This thing has been a nightmare from the beginning. I was given the order at my last appointment. I called the local medical center, where I had it done last time, and they said they don't do it. OK, great, that meant I'd have to drive and hour and a half away to take it. Since it's a fasting test I planned to spend the night at Noni's and then go in to a health center over there and take it. I'd need to take at least half a day off from work. No great biggie.

Except the weather has conspired against me ever since. Every time I'd plan to make the trip over we'd have snow. There's no way I'm crossing four mountains in the snow. My next plan was to take a full vacation day this Friday to go for the test and then maybe enjoy some shopping. Except, I got a call from the medical director at our local medical center. I had spoken earlier with one of the nurses from there who said they were still buying the glucose, so she wasn't sure why I was told they don't do the test. The population is so small here they rarely ever give it, but she wasn't sure why I was turned away. She had finally talked to the medical director about it and then the medical director called me to tell me they'd do it. This was Wednesday. I made arrangements for coverage at work and then called for an appointment this morning. Yay! I wouldn't have drive 120 mile round-trip to do this!

I went in this morning and they took my base blood sugar level with the meter. It was 68. Then they gave me glucose, it was a lot grosser than I remembered from the first time. I went and sat for my hour (this was after waiting 30 minutes to get in to begin with). I came back and the nurse wasn't ready for me quite yet, but the medical director was standing there. She apologized again for the misunderstanding and while I had her there I asked her if she happened to know what the upper threshold number would be on the one-hour test. She looked at my chart and told me 130. Finally the nurse had time for me and we began with the meter test. It came back 148. Crap! Then the director made some comment to the nurse about "you gave her 50 mg. of glucose, right?" The nurse had no idea. She just gave me the whole bottle she had after checking with two other nurses that that was the correct amount. Turns out she gave me 100 mg. Ha ha, oops. The double-dosed me on glucose. No wonder my number was so high.

The director went and made a phone call to see if we could redeem the test. The answer was "yes" if we just turned it into the three-hour glucose test. You know, the test you're praying to avoid as you take the one-hour test?

So my morning did not go at all like I'd planned. They were very apologetic. Every nurse involved, plus the director and even office aides apologized. I ended up going to my husband's store and sitting for about 25 minutes while I waited to go back for my second draw at 11:35 a.m. Then I went home and packed my lunch during the wait for the 12:35 p.m. draw. I had to pick up Emma from school in there too so she stood by me while I had the last blood draw. Then I took her to the babysitter's and went to work. Needless to say I was feeling pretty hungry and weak by then.

The good news is according to the meter I should pass my test.
At one hour my number should have been less than 180, it was 148
At two hours my number should have been less than 155, it was 136
At three hours my number should have been less than 140, it was 123

We'll still have to wait for official results from the blood vials sent off to the lab, but I think I passed. All's well that ends well (until I get the bill) :)
Written at 5:05 PM by Highlandgal.
|