re blood glucose test strips in article apr omen uucp caf omen uucp chuck forsberg wa kgx writes in article apr clpd kodak com young serum kodak com writes human glucose mg dl fasting are these numbers for whole blood or plasma serum actually but plasma numbers are the same whole blood numbers for humans tend to be somewhat lower roughly to percent lower i find the following range for whole blood in fundamentals of clinical chemistry n w teitz editor w b saunders human glucose whole blood fasting levels mg dl which are the strips calibrated for obviously they measure whole blood indeed they do measure whole blood levels although they are not as accurate as a serum test done in a laboratory one problem is that cells in the sample continue to metabolize glucose after the sample is drawn reducing the apparent level according to teitz however results compare reasonably well with laboratory results although values below mg dl tend to be lower with strip tests whereas values above mg dl can be very erratic what is the conversion factor between human plasma glucose and whole blood pin prick glucose concentration as stated above whole blood levels tend to be roughly to percent lower than serum levels sample freshness will affect whole blood levels however i don t believe there is a well defined conversion factor since cell metabolism will affect samples to varying degrees the serum plasma test is much preferred for any except general ball park testing rich young these are not kodak s opinions
