Blood sugar. Done by finger prick and by drawing blood sample. Are they the same readings? Does anyone know?

[Mummy2025x]

When checking blood sugar say by finger prick and the machine and you get a reading of 4.3 and having blood sample taken directly from vein, are they basically around same value more or less ? Curious ! Thanks

They can be slightly different due to different machinery being used to test. The sample drawn from a vein and tested in a laboratory would be considered more accurate than a finger prick on a glucometer. Other things that can affect glucometer readings would be not washing hands beforehand and having something sugary on your hands.

@TheIceBear thanks. When you say slightly different, not too much of a difference though roughly around same give or take? Nothing significant in the readings ?

It depends what type of test. If it's the finger prick it takes a current reading. If it's the type you send away to measure HbA1c then it will be a long term reading (2 or 3 months).

they're is often a small difference, but it's close enough that both are fine so long as they're taken properly (clean hands for the fingerprick test). If they're doing it from a vein though for diagnostic purposes it may be an HbA1c that they're testing rather than glucose.

@Mummy2025x a lab sample can also be used for current readings. there shouldn’t be a significant difference but it would depend on various factors, the glucometer should be calibrated daily etc. why do you ask anyway ?

I think they should be similar but the blood draw is much more accurate. Even for diagnostic tests like the GTT they draw blood which they wouldn’t do if a fingerprick test was good enough.

Yes the finger prick is slightly less reliable IIUC.

Maybe it's not even slightly but actually by quite a bit? I could be misremembering. Some of that might be personal vs. clinical I guess?

Is this from a GTT? My fingerprint test was 5.6 but my bloods from the lab was 4.9, which is quite a big difference I think.

@TheIceBear i had my GTT yesterday, in the morning I checked my blood just with finger prick and it was 4.3. When I got to the hospital the health care assistant just took blood sample instead of even doing finger prick…. I remember before in 2020 when I was pregnant and had the gtt that it was a finger prick (no blood sample taken)
but apparently that’s changed since then and they now have too take blood sample instead of finger prick. It’s no big deal was just curious if it would be similar readings. Thanks for answering.

I had the GTT with my first in 2022 and it was already a blood draw then. Different hospitals might have slightly different procedures too. The first time I had 3 blood draws 0, 1hr and 2hr and last week I had it again and only 2 blood draws (0 and 2hr).

I guess it is good to use the more accurate measure since they sometimes diagnose GD based on a slightly out of range reading.