CONTOUR DIABETES app (US) Reviews

by Dean_louder_ML

My health plan provided this device (CONTOUR nextONE) glucose meter and I have been very disappointed.

Either the user interface is very crude (or I just can’t find the settings...and it could be that). BUT...

I guess I have taken it for granted that iPad apps automatically adjust the display to landscape from portrait, and back again, depending on the position you hold the device. I cant get CONTOURDIABETESappUS to do that.

Also, the display size is HUGE. I’m not visually impaired and I don’t need or want a display with 1” tall letters. I would also like the option to easily see my results laid out in a chart form. I would expect this would be a basic feature too.

A chart mode showing Glucose number by date...maybe color coded for time of day, or other relevant factor. I haven’t found the chart function if there is one.

It would be easier/less frustrating to just never sync this device again and just keep a paper record of the results and under them into a spreadsheet every so often.

The glucose meter saves date and reading data so CONTOURDIABETESappUS (so far) is of very little use to me.

by Yode75

Why can’t synced readings be deleted but manually entered ones can?
Ability to delete a synced reading needs to be incorporated.

follow up:
I called the number provided to inquire about this lack of functionality...the tech indicated a reading was unable to be deleted because it was medical information. That’s bunk... I informed him that it was MY medical information that I rightfully should be able able to manage. The likely possibility of an erroneous reading should be able to be removed. I also stated that the reading I wanted to delete was a reading of my wife ....she has a meter and thought it was malfunctioning so we used my meter to compare results. He stated the meter is meant to be a personal device which it is for all intended purposes....except for this incident. Additionally, there is no provision that prevents someone from using my personal meter without my knowledge (ie no access control). I also asked if it was taboo to delete “medical information” why does the meter begin deleting reading stories after 800 (by FIFO method)? It’s a application design flaw....straight up.

by Ipadpro17

The contour next one is advertised as having Bluetooth connection to our iPhones. Sadly this doesn’t just work like it should. Before using it you are required to register a new account. I don’t see why any account is needed - apparently it’s so they can take your data and store it in their cloud. Hmmmm, not thrilled about that at all. Still, you have to accept their terms and conditions and register to get to use what you’ve paid for. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve tried registering. Tried it using my iPhone and my iPad and it just DOES NOT WORK. I can’t get CONTOURDIABETESappUS to reach confirmation before it complains. Yes I do have internet connection, and yes I’ve double checked all my data I’ve been required to provide. Can’t get in. That’s where the bait and switch comes in. Bated by CONTOURDIABETESappUS that is not available. $20+tax. Very disappointed. No response from customer support.

by Bike2k

There are so many areas where CONTOURDIABETESappUS appears to be written by developers who have no idea about what diabetics need in an app. My top two complaints (and I've reported these and others to the Tech Support department over the phone) are the following:
- Entering long acting insulin can only be entered tagged to a BG reading. This is not how long acting insulin is used. It needs tone able to be entered as its own event. This problem was reported a long time ago and it's still not fixed. Come on guys and girls, this is not rocket science. I've been writing software for 40+ years... it ain't that hard!
- With the Contour Next USB, comments such as being sick, activity, time after meals, etc were entered directly in the meter. Now with the Contour Next One this has all been moved to CONTOURDIABETESappUS . This means that I either have to carry something that runs CONTOURDIABETESappUS so I can enter these comments immediately so I don't forget, or I have to write notes on paper until I can get to CONTOURDIABETESappUS later to make my entries.

I get no sense of urgency from this company to get these problems fixed and there is no communication from them. I have 1 vial of test strips left and if I don't get some sense of forward progress I will be switching to a different BG monitoring system. Bye Contour, it was nice while it lasted.

by Kattia26

I love the fact that you can take pics and do different things from other apps. I know we all agree that it needs Apple capabilities. A few different things that I noticed needs update is, I am unable to add provider/doctor info without adding an email. We don’t use email to contact doctors with Sharp Rees-Stealy. We use Follow My Health and send them messages through that portal. The other thing is that we are not able to add times of when we take our medication and it would be nice to add the strength of medication we take in addition to how much. It also doesn’t let me delete medications which is a problem. I had accidentally entered wrong info and even though it says I can edit it doesn’t let me. I switched from the One Touch Verio and their app is rated almost 5 stars with over 16,000 users. I hope that Contour’s developers can take a look at their app and see where they need to make the improvements. But I switched here because I think that once these bugs are worked out and the necessary upgrades are made, CONTOURDIABETESappUS can definitely outrank One Touch even if they are in the top 100 app.

by Modern Jess

CONTOURDIABETESappUS is good at what it does — reading glucose measurements from Contour Next One devices over Bluetooth. Unfortunately, the developers have prioritized their own data needs over those of the consumer. CONTOURDIABETESappUS prioritizes uploading your glucose data to their proprietary cloud server over syncing with the Health app. And if the cloud server isn’t responding, the reading won’t show up in the Health app until their servers come back on line.

If that weren’t bad enough, CONTOURDIABETESappUS has an extraordinarily hard time syncing to the Health app even on a good day. Typically, it requires force-quitting CONTOURDIABETESappUS one or two or even three times before it finally gets around to registering the latest reading with the Health app. What should be simple and nearly instantaneous instead becomes a tedious chore for each and every reading. Honestly, it would be easier just to manually enter the data into the Health app yourself.

This is MY medical data. I expect that MY need to use MY data should take priority. The Contour Next One pitches itself as a convenient way to get your glucose readings into your phone. It ultimately fails to make the process any more convenient than a traditional glucose meter.

by Bkronan

The Contour app has several deficiencies that must be addressed. First and foremost, integration with Health app. Second, CONTOURDIABETESappUS does not provide any option for export of data except as a pre-defined pdf document. For those of us who are data driven, this is insufficient. My doctor requires much more detail of my readings than the pdf can provide. Please implement an export function to .csv to allow importing of data into a more useable data source. The Next One meter is supposedly supported in Bayer's Glucofacts software. This is NOT supported on the Mac OS X platform. Please fix this to maintain compatibility with previous Next meter readings that have been imported to that software. Lastly, the bluetooth connection should launch the mobile app upon establishing communication between device an d meter. The iOS app should not have to be running in the background for meter information to be transferred. Automatically launch CONTOURDIABETESappUS please, integrate with Health app, and provide options for export.

by Master Of Old Thunder

Dear Sir or Madam, I was hoping that the Contour next one with blue tooth would be able to export data to other apps. Especially the “health data” app aka known as that heart icon. Because being able to import to where I need the data helps with transposing numbers etc. Example Glucose reading of 105 versus 501. When one has dylexia it just gets harder. I use a program called diabetes pilot which not only tracks the glucose, buts help calculate the insulin shots. I also am getting ready for a Dexcom tracking meter, but still requires “calibrating” twice a day. Dexcom pulls the data through the Heart health ap. What I am trying to do is have better control. It also pulls data from a program called nutritionist which helps calculate the insulin for meals. Which as you know can cause the great swings of glucose numbers. Your system must think I am a robot. I can put in a specific time but to remind after a meal needs to be simpler. Because I can plan to have lunch at 12:30 but due to “life”I May not get a break until 1:15 pm. So the rest of the readings of the day need to change. And with ADD, I can get distracted too darn easy. But yours is a start but needs lots of refinement. The first thing I suggest is the integration with the “health” data ap which comes preloaded on every iphone and I pad. Thank you for taking the time to read this.

by ***Ïñ²ÑФ***

Great app. Been using it for about a year and haven’t run into any problems. The only thing that is annoying. Is that it seems to need to be running and open to backup. This makes CONTOURDIABETESappUS slow when first open and some times even crash. Can you please have it back up in the background. And what is it with not having autocorrect ?

Update. Since the last couple of updates. CONTOURDIABETESappUS keeps on crashing. Seems to be that it can’t handle editing while is backing up. This needs to backup when not in use. I dot have the time to be waiting for the backup to finish before I can mark the meal type. I really like the meter. But if CONTOURDIABETESappUS doesn’t get fixed. I’ll be looking for another. Already called support. All they had me do was reinstall CONTOURDIABETESappUS . And the issue continues.

by Kjasont

I really enjoy having my readings sync to CONTOURDIABETESappUS . That bit works great! However I really wish it would also sync the data with Health Kit, as that’s where I keep track of all my other health data. So, even with the sync to CONTOURDIABETESappUS, I find I still have to manually enter the reading into Health Kit; or loss the ability to look at things like weight compared to BS.

Similarly, you cannot delete meter readings. I used my meter to test a friend, that wasn’t feeling well. Now their reading is stuck in my log. Which is also why I still have to manually enter my data into another app...the log/averages in CONTOURDIABETESappUS are no longer accurate.

Seeing how the main advantage for me, is the sync of data. This really lowers its usefulness to me personally.

by CK14191

How can an iOS app that is exclusively health related not integrate with Apple HealthKit. I would understand if HealthKit relatively new, but after four years I’m pretty sure CONTOURDIABETESappUS developers have had plenty of time to figure out how to get data into and out of HealthKit. The only explanations at this point are laziness, lack of focus, or a lack of ability.

Overall, CONTOURDIABETESappUS seems dated. The graphs and charts do not do a particularly good job of showing trends, and everything feels like an app from the 3GS days (right down to the old style keyboard). CONTOURDIABETESappUS does do a good job of grabbing readings from the monitor, but I probably would have gone for a different brand (or at least no upgraded to CONTOURDIABETESappUS enabled model) had I known how bad CONTOURDIABETESappUS was. So now I use CONTOURDIABETESappUS to capture my readings and then manually log my readings to another, more useful app that does have HealthKit integration, which pretty much defeats the purpose of automatic logging.

I would suggest the company either invest in some new developers or outsource app development to someone that can make meaningful updates in a timely manner. Just adding HealthKit integration and granting me the ability to automatically get my data out of CONTOURDIABETESappUS and into something useful would go a long way. As it stands right now CONTOURDIABETESappUS is so bad I’m willing to pay out of pocket for test strips to get a better experience.

by Hansaman

CONTOURDIABETESappUS works and is good but could be great with a tweak. I have never been able to send emails of my reports. I always get an error. I contacted CONTOURDIABETESappUS developer only to get a reply to call an 800 number. That is unsatisfactory to me. They know there is an issue and should be able to fix it. I like how CONTOURDIABETESappUS syncs to their cloud but there is apparently no way for the user and probably more importantly, a doctor, to access that cloud. It would be great if my doctor could access my readings remotely and if I could email them but that is not possible.

I am running official version of iOS 11 but also had issues when running beta versions.

Maybe a future update to CONTOURDIABETESappUS will fix these issues.

by Fmfmfkdkskskd

I agree with everyone who has said Apple Health needs to be included. While the graphs are nice within CONTOURDIABETESappUS we really need to be able to more easily correlate the data to what we have in Apple Health. Every other piece of health data is there already.

As well, it would be nice to know/see where our data is being stored in the cloud. I like Glooko in the fact that I can log in online and run reports from any computer. I would move to Glooko 100% but there seems to be a bug with he Contour Next One meter.

For me, not seeing or having access to the back end data seems a bit limited and concerning. Consider this; what happens if I decide to get a different meter and stop using Contour, is my data still in the cloud? Do I have the option to delete it?

CONTOURDIABETESappUS isn’t completely horrible. If you’re looking for a simple logbook it is great and reliable. For those wanting a bit more, you may want to consider Glooko (assuming the bugs are worked out).

by BoxcarJoe

Admittedly I just installed and started using this meter/app - but while downloading CONTOURDIABETESappUS for this device I wasn’t expecting much from CONTOURDIABETESappUS .

So you can imagine I was shocked to see a feature rich app with functionality that speaks pretty loudly to the idea that they have tried to create a full featured app that from the looks of it will easily do most if not all of what I need it to do.

Just looking at it I can tell it’s a far cry better than where CONTOURDIABETESappUS must have started - I’m looking at the reviews and the fact that someone took the time to reply screams of a development team that is working to create a product that really works. I can’t fine anything about that to complain about.

by B_99_Conrad

So, like many people, I like to read reviews. When I initially downloaded CONTOURDIABETESappUS to connect it to my tester I had very low expectations due to all the negative reviews and the low ratings. However while using it I discovered that its come a long way from those reviews. One of my favorite parts of CONTOURDIABETESappUS is the reminders. If your like me and forget to test often you can set up a system to remind you to test after eating, at a specific time, or even just daily reminders. Though it took me a bit to learn that CONTOURDIABETESappUS can only get numbers from your tester if your tester is on and your phone is near it. CONTOURDIABETESappUS doesn’t need to be open though. All in all, decent app.

by Pri-dledeedle

The other reviews that rate CONTOURDIABETESappUS poor to fair must be commenting on an old version. The current capabilities within CONTOURDIABETESappUS and meter are impressive. No more manually entering things or transposing data to communicate with my healthcare provider! The reports and graphs this thing can generate are tremendously helpful, beautifully designed, and are so quick to Provide to my doctor. All this, and still more functionality at half the price or less than my OneTouch Ultra was. Would recommend to anyone.

by Coyote Old Man

Very easy to use. There are issues at times where the application fails. However, all you need to do is reinstall the application and the issue goes away. After all, with so many variables like phones, laptops, iPads and so forth coupled with multiple operating systems, one can’t expect perfection. The other device and application I used before had serious issues that made me question the accuracy. I have high confidence if the application says my blood sugar level is high, it is. And that’s what’s really important...accuracy you can trust without doubt.

by Nightcap

I am updating this review thanks to a holiday present from Ascencia: Apple Health is now supported!

I just re-installed CONTOURDIABETESappUS to my iPhone and took a reading. Voila! It’s entered into the Health app.

Thank you for (finally) bringing the world’s best meter into the 21st century. Happy holidays!

———8< snip! >8———

I’ve been waiting for months hoping that the Contour app would support Apple HealthKit. It is clear they have no intention of doing so. Perhaps they don’t want to abide by Apple’s privacy policies, or maybe they’re just incompetent. Whatever the reason, don’t bother downloading CONTOURDIABETESappUS.

If you have an iPhone XS, CONTOURDIABETESappUS breaks with a 125 error. You then get to go to a website and scroll through the nations of the world before finally reaching your country, at which point you get to write an email to support. This nonsense would tend to support the “incompetence” hypothesis.

The Contour is a decent meter, but you’ll have to enter the reading manually into the Health app.

by Airmoses

I just downloaded app two days ago onto an iPhone 11. So far everything is working flawless. I was able to download, open, create an account, pair my Contour Next One on the first try, and log 10 readings to it so far. I love the plot line graph, being able to add notes and information to each reading, and the running averages for 7, 14, 30, and 90 days.

I am new to this tester and app usage, so I don’t know what I am missing (I read some critical reviews about it not integrating with healthkit). I see messages of it syncing with the cloud, so hopefully I won’t lose data with future upgrades (Other critical reviews I read). Only time will tell, but so far I am happy with CONTOURDIABETESappUS.

by Omacsguru

I was discouraged from downloading CONTOURDIABETESappUS because I read the reviews and everyone was saying it’s not compatible to Apple products so I tried different ones. I tried the bant which for about a week worked great then it stopped transferring my blood glucose results to my phone and Apple Health. I then tried the Glucose Buddy but it did not transfer nor did the glucose app transfer my results to my phone and I had to input my readings in manually. I gave up and just for the sake of trying out the contour next app I downloaded it and am so impressed with it. It automatically transfers my reading to the contour app and syncs with my Apple Health. I’m so glad I did not listen to the reviews, CONTOURDIABETESappUS is great and works the way I need it to.

by Eagleart54

I use the contour next link bc I am on a Medtronics pump. Although I do upload my pump to their site for my personal studies of My type 1 X 55 yrs.
with my studies of my type 1 ( I'm disabled RN). I have accomplished things considered medically impossible. I have 3 respiratory diseases a never smoked individual I have excellent blood sugar control on or off steroids for these respiratory diseases. In order to continue improving my immune system blood sugar control is essential. If your app for my iPhone would work with the Contour Next Link it would make monitoring much easier for me considering I also have " hypoglycemia unawareness ". I test 10-15 times a day. Consistently. Would be nice and convenient until I'm
Home and can upload to the carelink site. And can review the day's activities affect my glucose levels. I also advise on two type one support groups so I already push the contour next meter bc of its 15% margin of error. I've looked for other cell apps which I could link my meter to by just putting the Meyer serial number in as it is with the Medtronics pumps. I'll keep
Looking. Thanks anyway.

by Juan Mann

I am re-writing my review based on the newest update for CONTOURDIABETESappUS. I have upped my score to 4 stars. First, they have fixed most of the complaints that I had about the reports. Also they have revamped the menu structure. The menus now make much more sense. The reports are now in a "connections" tab. Configuring the reports works pretty well. And now you email the reports, if you desire, by tapping on a send icon, where you have a choice of things like email, print, so on. I only have one remaining complaint, and I hope someone is paying attention to this... the reports force you to enter a patient's name every time you start a report. It would be really nice if you only had to enter it once and CONTOURDIABETESappUS would remember it. Or at least provide a checkbox that says "save name for future reports."

CONTOURDIABETESappUS is getting much better and I hope that they continue to smooth out the rough edges and make CONTOURDIABETESappUS more user-friendly and intuitive.