Contour USB II

Everyone who saw the Contour USB used the same one word.

COOL!

The initial responses to this thing were fantastic. Styling counts. My 16 year old T1 said it was about time Bayer stepped up their game. We joked about teachers mistaking it for an iPod - that is a design compliment.

This Meter is cool. The old Contour - not so cool.

Interestingly everyone who used it a has a similar response the first test. They all like Bayer’s method of tagging before or after meals. That being, it asks for a tag while it is counting down the blood test. There are two plusses here. 1) You log the blood check as before or after a meal. 2) It give you something to do while the meter thinks. Bayer calls this AutoLog. Nice use of the five second it takes to calculate a number.

I wondered if AutoLog would get old. Delaney used it the most of anyone and she didn’t ever complain about the AutoLog feature.

All of y’all out there in DOC land asked the same question - how much blood? Well it is a regular Contour strip. It uses a lot - 0.6 μL. That a ton more than our Jazz meters use.

The color screen is way easier to read than any meter I have seen. Big kudos there. I never took it out into direct sunlight and can’t say if that is an issue or not. The screen does a nice job of changing to tell you what the buttons do. Maybe it is just the landscape layout but it seems easier to line up the button function and the button than most meters.

Also in the cool feature department is the illuminated test strip port. Makes confirming a late night CGM reading a lot easier. Every meter should have this.

I am not a fan of Bayer lancing device. Mostly because it seems bigger than it needs to be. Now this may be a design play for the older lest dexterous type 2 market, I don’t know, but size matters to me and their lancing device is too big. Here it is with a smaller WaveSense pokie. As previously noted the colored lancets were a big hit with the tween and 4 year old TDL.


On the topic of size, somehow the case for The fairly small Contour USB meter is bigger than a Jazz case. As previously advertised in my world smaller is better.

The real deal here is the USB port. After everyone (Delaney, Connor and TLD) gave it a test blood test there were enough data points to test out the software. Plug and play. It was easy enough.

No cable. Standard USB Plug. WoHoo! Score Bayer! Not only groove styling but actual standardized connectivity, functionality anyone with a computer can use!

The software is fairly straight forward. I grabbed a few screen screen grabs and a few pictures are worth a lot more more than a bunch of my words. So here goes:

Nice straight forward log book. Different colors for in range, low and high.

You can click and see your log book into a nice groovy chart. Same color scheme. Just a note here when you look at the log in the meter the in range is white text and high and low are both orange. I guess the meter programing geeks and the software that is going to live in the meter geeks didn't get the same memo on how to use colors.

Pie charts for Thanksgiving dinner dessert.

And you can setup the meter at the keyboard. That green blob there is teling me the default seetings for high and low are different than what I put in the merer. One quick click solved that.

I agree with the teenager the Contour USB puts Bayer back into the game with good design and a significantly smaller form factor. Yo Tim across the pond, you need to check one of these out.Mostly all good. The sample size is a tad big, so is the case. My views on case colors is that with two type 1 kids around (three when we babaysit TLD) you need to be able to tell what meter goes with what kid at a glance. Color helps a lot.


If you are using Contour strips now get one of the these bad boys. They rock. If you are on a meter you don’t love give it a try.

Bayer Dudes. Y’all need to come back to Friends for Life. Bring guitar hero and this meter. You will get converts. WaveSense needs a run for their money and so far you are it.

Bayer Contour USB: First Look

The good folks at Bayer sent me a Contour USB. Here's a quick look.

(See the Update Here)

Bernard my friend, you will be impressed.

Bernard and I have "issues" with proprietary cables. Your Diabetes May Vary, your meter cables don't need to but they do. Except for this one - check it out - no cable. Standard USB plug built in.

Wait, wait, before I say anymore - the full disclosure: When Bayer announced this thing a few weeks ago, I thought it looked cool. So I call to asked about it. They were kind enough to send me one to test out. Wohoo!

No conditions on their part.
No promise other than to try it out on my part.

The full review will have to wait for some more actual use. I'm going to give it to the teen T1 and he'll do most of the BG tests and contribute to the comments. Unill he sheds some blood for the cause - here is the initial out of box experience.


Nice packaging and not too much of it. The meter is behind a little plastic bit. There is a sticker on the screen. BG at 93. Well at least it isn't 104 and some of the documentation shows the meter at a whopping 127 - LOL.

For those of you who have had little girls in you life you will be happy to hear there is no Barbie packaging. Barbie is lashed into her packaging by some freak with a bondage fetish and a heck of a lot of wire. The meter pops right out unencumbered by fasteners.

The Contour USB has rechargeable batteries. That is a first in my experience. It is real clear when you open the box you should charge the thing. The box flap says, "HELLO! - Charge me," or something there about.

USB - figuring out how to charge it isn't rocket science. Find an open USB port or use the charge in the box.

So far the out of box experience is a whole different class than your average crammed in folded cardboard for stable shipping packaging. Nice. Not clinically significant in any way but it is a clear expression of how they feel about their product and how they want you to feel about it.

You get one first impression. Score one for Bayer. Let see what else is in the box.

• Meter
• Charger
• USB extension cable
• Strips
• Bulky Bayer lancing device
• Lots of documentation
• Quick Start guide in case you don't want to read the above mentioned documentation.
• Paper logbook (as if)
• Web Registration card
• Wicked Cool Colored Lancets.

I didn't think Lancets could be cool.

I was wrong.

Colored lancets are cool. Don't take my word for it. Delaney spoke for the 'tweens of the world definitively claiming all the pink ones. The Tuesday Little Dude, speaking for the 4 year old PWD community, was also psyched choosing purple then blue for his 7:00 check. He was grabbing at them like they were Halloween candy when mom came to pick him up an hour later. Oh TLD you have no idea how much you amuse me.

Apparently Lancets can be cool. Who knew?

Having no actual experience with the meter we seized the moment and had TLD test drive the meter for his 7:00 check in. Both he and Mrs. YMDV made all kinds of happy sounds at the color screen. OK was new toy syndrome but what the heck! This is a first impressions bit and so far this thing is making friends with flashy first impressions.

As you can see the meter isn't large. Just a little bigger than a USB memory stick.

I lined it up against the usual suspects. A little smaller than a One Touch Ultra Mini. Longer but skinnier than a Jazz.















It is significantly smaller than the Ping meter that came with Connor's pump. (I noticed taking this picture he hadn't even bothered putting batteries in it.) I didn't put it in it's case but the case seems bigger than it needs to be and not gray as cool as the Jazz cases.

I did notice two things worth mentioning before I call it a day. The documentation I didn't read says the software runs on a Mac and while the box was about the size of a CD but look up there at that picture - there wasn't a software disk in the box.

D'OH! It is a USB stick!