Home Cholesterol Test

A few months ago I had a full blood panel performed at my doctor’s office and requested a copy of the results for my personal health file.  My total cholesterol level on the laboratory results was 134 mg/dL which is superb since being under 200 mg/dL is the “Desirable” level of total cholesterol for good health.  This made my competitive spirit happy since I clearly had a desirable level of cholesterol or I guess that would be a desirable level of lack of cholesterol.

Yesterday, I performed a home cholesterol test to see how the test worked and compare the results with my laboratory results.  CholesTrak is a total cholesterol testing kit available for home use with results in twelve minutes.  The CholesTrak test kit is FDA approved for home use and purports to quickly and accurately read your total cholesterol level.

The test comes with a testing device, results chart, finger stick lancet, gauze pad, bandaid and instructions.  The basic steps of the test are to wash your hands, use the lancet to stick your finger and draw blood, drop the blood sample into the test device, wait and then read results.  The instruction brochure had several pictures along the way to give you guidance on the steps and how to use the test device.  They also have an 800 phone number in the instructions and invite you to call the “help line” with questions as you take the test.

The finger lancet in the kit is very nice and definitely not painful to use.  You never see the blade which is good.  After you stick your finger you have to drop enough blood drops in the test device to fill this little well which seemed to be about three large drops of blood for me.  Once you fill the blood well, you have to set a timer for 3 minutes and then you will pull a tab off the side of the test device which appears to activate the test.

Now you wait again, this time for 10-12  minutes after pulling the tab  in order to read your results on the test device.   In the instructions it says to “…read test results under bright light within 15 minutes.  Find the very tip of the blue/purple color bar in the Measurement Scale, even if fuzzy or faint.”  While this sounds very easy, when you go to read the test device it is not quite clear the exact number of your reading.  Depending on the light you are in or how good your eyesight is, the result can seem to vary on the scale.  The first time I looked at it, I thought my result was 19.5 on the scale which would result in a total cholesterol of 138 mg/Dl.  I asked someone else to look at it and where they thought the very tip of the color bar was and they read it as 20.5 which is a total cholesterol of 148 mg/Dl.

I had a friend perform the test with the other test device that is in the box (it comes with two tests) and she had the same result, we both read a different number, but the range of total cholesterol with the two readings for her was 196-205.

So my test results were 138-148 compared to my lab results of 134 — pretty good.  Even with the range on the test result, the results are accurate and the test is easy to conduct at home with results in less than 15 minutes.  The Cholestrak test is $17.99 for two test devices which have a shelf life of over a year – you can buy the kit and use one now and then test yourself again in six months or a year.  For the price and the instant results this test did the job and is recommended for learning your total cholesterol level.