Dario Meter Review

I was sent a Dario All in One meter to review last month, so I figured it was time to get my review up.

When I first heard about the Dario meter, my initial thoughts were:

Cool, I can use my iPhone to test my sugar.

Awesome, the strips and lancing device are all in one, so less items I have to carry.

That was all I knew about the product before I received it.

When I first received the item in the mail, I liked the white box that the meter and strips came in. It felt very Apple-ish, and one thing to know about me, I love my Apple products. The box was actually extremely difficult to open. I basically had to rip the entire thing open because I couldn’t just easily take the meter and other items out of the box.

Inside the box was was the meter, lancets, the device that goes into the audible jack and a sample vial of 25 test strips.

The instruction manual made it very simple to set the meter up. On one end of the device the test strips slip into an open compartment that has a white cover. On the other end, the lancing device is attached. On the other side is a button to push up and then the actual meter pops out and plugs into the audible jack on your iPhone.

Setting up the meter itself was pretty quick and easy and simple to do.

The next step was to install the Dario app from the Apple Store. Once the app was installed, I just opened up the app and followed the instructions.

The kit also came with these bags to put your iPhone in so that there is no contamination of blood. This is a great idea, even though I only used the bags for the initial first test.

The entire set up was pretty easy to get ready to test.

My first test however, was not the best, as you can see.

The kit also came with an additional 25 test strips, so I used the meter 50 times. I feel after 50 tests, that is enough to determine whether or not you like something.

I loved having the app automatically logging my BG’s for me and giving me a quick snapshot of my average results. As soon as I opened the app, it provided me with what my average blood sugar was. As you can see, I had a rough couple of weeks with blood sugars. Also, this is why meter BG logging doesn’t always tell the whole story because if my CGM said 120, I don’t test, so it skews higher.

Final Thoughts

Overall, I did like the meter. I liked the ease of use and having the test strips and lancing device all in one. It was less that I had to carry. In fact, I didn’t even carry my whole meter bag that I usually do because I could just keep this in my pocket and that’s it. I like being able to test directly on my iPhone.

The biggest downside to me was that I had to have my phone on me in order to test. I like to test in the middle of the night when I wake up to use the bathroom, but pretty much every time I forgot my phone on my night stand and had to go back out from the bathroom to get my phone in order to test.

I also did not like that I had to wait to open up the app in order to test. It would be nice for the app to open automatically once the jack was plugged in. But hey, those are things that would make the perfect device. Testing on the iPhone was great, so I am not going to complain about having to open up the app first.

I would not use the Dario meter as my full time meter, however I would like to keep some test strips as a back up meter. I like it for traveling purposes because it’s easy to just put in my pocket.

I would recommend this meter to people though because overall, I like it.

What would make this meter the perfect fit?

Truly be all in one. Meaning that the test strips, lancing device and the meter itself is all in the same device, no needing to connect to the iPhone. Then, once the test is complete, it can send the results directly to my iPhone via Bluetooth without me needing to open up the app.

Have you used the meter? If so, I would love to hear your feedback.

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