Do Symptoms of Hypoglycemia Correlate with Measurements on Continuous Glucose Monitors?

Hypoglycemic symptoms don't always correlate with hypoglycemia documented by continuous glucose monitors (CGMs). To estimate the frequency of discordance between symptoms and CGM measurements, researchers recruited 600 people who used insulin to manage type 1 or 2 diabetes; participants wore CGMs and documented hypoglycemic symptoms. Mean ages were 47 for patients with type 1 diabetes and 63 for patients with type 2 diabetes. Median glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA_1c) was ≈7, and ≈25% of patients had poor hypoglycemic awareness according to a standardized questionnaire.

Most patients (84%) had at least one episode of CGM-detected hypoglycemia (glucose level <54 mg/dL). Median weekly rates of CGM-detected hypoglycemia were 1.3 episodes for patien…