Performance requirements, analytical accuracy and clinical accuracy of self-monitoring of blood glucose: A clinical perspective

The accuracy of self-monitoring of blood glucose (SMBG) levels is the line of defence in diabetic control and management and plays an important role in the treatment and outcome of diabetes therapy. Also, point-of-care blood glucose monitoring is extended to rapid detection of extreme blood glucose concentrations in patients, who are in a coma or have symptoms that suggest hypoglycaemia or hyperglycaemia. Therefore, there is a critical need to examine the analytical and clinical accuracy of the measured glucose levels obtained by such commercial glucose meters. The analytical accuracy can be described as the deviation between the reference and measured values. This parameter alone is not sufficient for the task of monitoring patients’ SMBG errors and the clinical consequence. This chapter addresses analytical accuracy and clinical accuracy of SMBG errors and compares the new type 1 diabetes error grid with a traditional Clarke error grid. Thus, it is important to consider if an improvement in analytical accuracy would lead to improved clinical outcomes for patients.