Better Test Strips

Better Test Strips

NFB RESOLUTION CALLS FOR BETTER TEST
STRIPS

Every year, at its annual convention, the National Federation
of the Blind considers resolutions of interest to blind people. Some of these
resolutions deal with diabetes.
Last year, the Federation asked blood glucose monitor manufacturers
and designers to make their products "speech ready." This year, Resolution
98-12 asks the same firms to upgrade their blood glucose monitor test strips
to more tactile/adaptive types (many of which are already available).
With appropriate adaptive equipment, such as talking blood glucose
monitors, blind diabetics, those losing vision, and those facing "fluctuating
vision" are just as capable of independent self-management (and thus full
participation in the mainstream) as are the sighted. It remains for the manufacturers
to provide us with the best possible adaptive equipment.
We are circulating the following to monitor developers and manufacturers.

National Federation of the Blind
RESOLUTION 98-12
WHEREAS, The Centers for Disease Control estimates 15.7 million
Americans have diabetes, and calls diabetes "the leading cause of new cases
of blindness in adults 20 to 74 years old," making this an issue of great
interest to the National Federation of the Blind; and
WHEREAS, all diabetics, blind or sighted, need to monitor blood
glucose levels accurately and frequently, in order to maintain health and reduce
risk of complications, and
WHEREAS, many of the common and popular types of home blood
glucose monitors available today require a hanging drop of blood, for correct
measurement, a complex, vision-intensive move difficult for many sighted diabetics
and an unnecessary burden to blind diabetics or those losing vision;
and
WHEREAS, other, simpler means of depositing blood onto the test
strip already exist, but most have yet to be integrated into glucose meters
with speech output for the blind; now, therefore,
BE IT RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in convention
assembled this tenth day of July, 1998, in the City of Dallas, Texas, that this
organization call upon all blood glucose monitor developers and manufacturers
to shift from hanging drop of blood systems to simpler and more accessible test
strip types.