Accu-chek - cleaned and checked

Last Saturday I attended Accu-chek clean and check programme. I bought an Accu-chek meter at the beginning of this year to monitor my blood sugar level. This programme is one of Accu-chek customer service programme.

First they sent us an invitation card and ask us to RSVP through phone. We are asked to bring our meter along to Holiday Inn Level 3. On reaching there, they took all our meters ( around 80+) to clean and check. Gruesome findings and the Roche staff were quite shocked to find some meters even have ants inside , some lancets still have blood and some casings have blood too!! I believe some of those belongs to the elderly people.



While our meters are clean and check we all attended a very informative talk about Carbohydrate counting.While surfing the net to look for extra info on Type 2 Diabetics, I always come across terms like 1 serving, carbohydrates exchange and I really really don't know what does that actually means....not till Doris, the speaker told and explain to us in detail and in Malaysian context too.

1 serving just means 15g of carbohydrates:( we are only looking at carbohydrates because that is the culprit for blood sugar since all carbo becomes glucose after digestion)
Coffee cup

1/2 coffee cup of cooked rice = 1 serving
1/2 coffee cup of meehoon or mee or kueh tiaw = 1 serving
one coffee cup of porridge ( since it is more watery)= 1 serving
3 dessertspoon ( the ordinary spoon ) of oats = 1 serving
1 small potato = 1 serving
1 slice of bread( white, wholemeal,full grain) = 1 serving
3 pieces of cream cracker = 1 serving
1/2 chapati = 1 serving
1/3 roti canai = 1 serving
1 medium size apple = 1 serving
1/2 medium size guava = 1 serving
1 slice water melon = 1 serving
1/2 slice pineapple = 1 serving
4 rambutans = 1 serving
3 cempedak = 1 serving

For diabetics we can only take maximum 12 servings of carbohydrates a day

Breakfast - 3 servings
Lunch - 4 servings
Afternoon tea - 1 serving
Dinner - 4 servings

so for breakfast if we take roti canai 1 piece = 3 servings
if we take bread 3 slices = 3 servings
if oat for breakfast 9 dsp of oats = 3 servings


Lunch of 4 servings means 1 1/2 cups of rice + one medium apple = 4 servings
veggies, fish, meat - no carbo so can eat as much as you want!

tea time - 3 cream crackers = 1 serving for tea

dinner - same as for lunch

We also learn from Doris that the accepted blood sugar level for fasting is 4.5 to 6.1 mmol/L
non fasting is 4.5 to 8.0 mmol/L ( can only be be taken 2 hours after meal )
I have been hearing a lot about this controversial readings so it is good to get a confirmation from the real Accu-chek experts.

The best time for diabetics to take fruits is after meal and not before meal . The reason is fruits contains simple sugar which is easily absorbed by the body system so taking it before meal will shoot the blood sugar reading sky rocket high!!

Food that diabetics should avoid:
1. Mango
2, Dry fruits like dates
3. Milo ( even w/o sugar) cos Milo itself has sugar
4. Honey
5. Carrots

For durian lovers who are diabetics, the advice given is can eat but only eat 1 small piece a day then need to substract some servings from the meal.

I really learn a lot of things that morning. Thanks to Accu-chek.


P/s The one on the left was my former F1 to F3 Home science teacher. She has been on diabetic medication for the last 10 years already.
Makes me wonder: Are food lovers more prone to diabetics???