Samantha Walsh
Samantha Walsh has lived with type 1 diabetes for over five years since 2017. After her T1D diagnosis, she was eager to give back to the diabetes community. She is the Community and Partner Manager for T1D Exchange and helps to manage the Online Community and recruit for the T1D Exchange Registry. Prior to T1D Exchange, Samantha fundraised at Joslin Diabetes Center. She graduated from the University of Massachusetts with a Bachelors degree in sociology and early childhood education.
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How soon after you were diagnosed with T1D did you start a CGM? Cancel reply
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Many years. When I was Dx (1982) home monitors weren’t available yet. I’d have to look at a Dexcom timeline to see when I started with CGM – I started with the old Dexcom Seven.
No CGM when I was diagnosed. And no glucose monitir
About 28 yrs
Diagnosed in 1976. Started the CGM in 2008. 32 years between them.
55 YEARS LATER!!! (The “monitoring” part immediately, the tech did not exist until 5 decades later).
I come from the dark ages where you peed in a cup and put in a beaker and dropped pill in to see what color it turned. I prayed for blue not brown.
Yes. The first big advance was moving from the test tube to a test strip. That took several years to happen. (More like a decade.)
Bright orange is the color I remember.
Kind of a loaded question, this condition that we have in common, Autoimmune Diabetes, I endured for a half century before the name T1D or TypeOne was invented, I did try one of the first continuous monitors at that time and gave up on it after a few months – it didn’t provide any worthwhile information and was probably “dangerous” to rely on the values presented.
I did begin using a valuable CGM 63 years after my arrival into the diabetes world and I’ve continued to thrive with it’s very reliable performance.
Dude, the first portable, finger-stick glucose METERS weren’t even a thing. Latest and greatest were those Chemstrips you’d drip your blood sample on to, wait for the color to change, then match it to color swatches on the tube they came in to get your BG range. The big trick we all learned was you could split the strips in half the long way and double your prescription. Anyway, doing the math, dx’d in 1983, got my first CGM, a Dexcom Share G4 in 2015. So 32 years.
we share this experience!
Diagnosed in 1985. Started DexCom G3 around 2013. About 28 years
As a recently diagnosed person I was blessed to leave the hospital with a cgm that was 4 years ago feels much longer!!
Probably 25 years after diagnosis. Finger pricks didn’t even exist when I was diagnosed.
Diagnosed in 1967. Got my first cgm 52 years later.
2006 minus 1951 equals 55 years. 55 years? Yikes, how did I ever do it? Now my instant gratification infirmities cause me to go berserk if I don’t know BG within 55 seconds. 😑
Diagnosed in 1973 and started using a CGM in 2019= 46 years.
They did not have them when I began, I have had diabetes for 50 years.
Diagnosed in 1974
I was diagnosed in 1966. I got a pump 33 years later (1999). I didn’t get a CGM that provided results in real time until 4 years after that (2003).
I was diagnosed in 1968, many years before blood glucose meters became available, and many many years before CGMs became available. I got a CGM as soon as I could after they became available.
There were no CGM’s when I was first diagnosed. So glad to have this great tool!!
I was diagnosed in 1945, and started a CGM in 2015.
I was diagnosed in 1978. Back then we had to test our urine in a testube and there were only I think 4 gradations; none, trace, low and high.
I got my CGM in 2020.
39 years.
1. Nov 1979, the Navy knew/discovered but didn’t tell me. (found out when I ordered my military records)
2. Apr 1990, blood sugar tested at over 3000. Admitted to hospital. Released 42 days later. No one told me then either.
3. Jun 1992, Home blood glucose says 652 (neighbors glucometer). Went to ER. Officially diagnosed as T1D. Next day saw an Endo. Given fast acting and slow acting insulin and syringes.
4. Feb 2017, First insulin pump.
5. May 2018, First Sensor & transmitter. Thus beginning CGM…
As I can best recall.
#2 numbers happened when my kidney’s, pancreas and lungs failed.
Oh my goodness what a journey. Hope you are doing well
I tried the Medtronic CGM years ago. It was awful. Big clam shell shape with the very thick needle. Didn’t use for very long. Been with Dexcom for years now. Started with G5. Had to use FSL for a year due to insurance. But went back to Dexcom. On the G7 and it’s all right but I do think the G6 was more accurate. Was just kind of arguing with tech support today regarding the over patch. They must have changed adhesives because mine stays on using SkinTac. Never had one fall off. She was saying I needed patch because that was what was approved. Good grief. Do not like that patch. Doesn’t help the accuracy.
Hah! CGMs didn’t exist for the first 40 years or so of my life with T1D. I was diagnosed in 1962 and I started using one in 2002.
Cgm didnt exist. I was diagnosed in 1961 didn’t start till 2021 so my answer 60 years since diagnosis
Like others, I was diagnosed before even blood glucose meters… but, I don’t remember precisely when I finally got a CGM that “stuck”. (I had two “trying CGM” failures before I got to one I could handle.)
But, to answer the question, it was _approximately_ 40 to 45 years from diagnosis to CGM.
The better question for this crowd would be “How long after CGM became available did you start using one?”
yes to the question.
All this experience and history…
Diagnosed in ’98, a CGM ’17, although stopped using one for several years (an old dog’s meds were more important). The last 3 years.
I was dx’d with T1D in 1956, CGM wasn’t even a dream. I was part of a sensor pilot study in 1975, but it took a decade to bring the technology to market. The electronics did not exist to make it work, the prototype I wore was in a backpack with a car battery and a paper graph it would record for four hours. The DEXCOM G7 has come a long way.
I was dad Type 1 in 1976. I started using a CGM in 2019. Prior to that I was test via meter on average 8 x per day to maintain good control.
About 40 years here.
I answered other since more than 6 years doesn’t adequately describe my situation. I was diagnosed T1D in 1966. In my 30’s, in grad school, I wrote an interesting paper on how useful it would be to computer control blood glucose with insulin delivery for optimal control. The only problem I had was the technology didn’t exist (yet).
I was prescribed a Libre 2 at the same time I was prescribed long and short acting insulin. I had the device in my arm the first time I injected insulin. I’ve never known T1D life without a CGM.
38 years!
I was diagnosed in 1972. No cgm no finger sticks
How about more than 40 years?