Glooko going spare

I was kindly offered the chance of trialling the Glooko meter sync cable and app early in August. Holiday madness rather overtook our household so it wasn't until last week that I was able to give it a go. the Glooko cable and app allow you to import data from one (or several) popular BG meters directly into your iPhone/iPod Touch. Once imported entries can have additional details (such as carbs, insulin dose, meal marker, comments) added. Subsequently nicely formatted data tables can be exported out as an email for printing or sharing with your healthcare team.

Unfortunately I can't really offer a 'proper' review or opinion because as it turns out the old blue Accu-Chek Aviva that I had intended to use for the trial is not compatible with the cable (though newer black ones would be).

What I saw of the app was straightforward enough. Unusually this logging app includes carb-lookup information which might allow you to have a better 'stab in the dark' guess at a meal than usual. This information (including nutritional breakdown) can be logged against your meal. From what I can see the app doesn't appear to offer graphing of your data, averages, SD or other analysis tools, opting instead for a simple table format with pre/post meal markers. Notes and comments are available either from a predefined list or can be typed in a box.

I would suggest that the Glooko cable would suit more occasional loggers, especially for users of Accu-Chek meters. The majority of meters it works with plug in via 3.5mm jack, but the optional Infra Red adapter (sold separately) requires you to line up the iPhone quite carefully, put the meter into IR transmit mode and then press 'sync' on the Glooko app. This is all very well if you want to import a day's or a week's worth of readings, but would take significantly longer than typing X.X into a box while hurrying so that your dinner doesn't get cold. Since the app is free, and the meter cable is what you buy, there is no way of adding BG values manually.

If you would like to try the iPhone BG meter sync cable for yourself the lovely folks at Glooko have suggested that I offer it to any of our readers who would like it (check Glooko.com for a list of compatible meters, and you would need an iPhone/iPod Touch, obviously). If you are interested, leave a comment below.