Artifactual hypoglycemia: An old term for a new classification

The American Diabetes Association and The Endocrine Society workgroupon the 2013 classification of hypoglycemia(1) in patients with diabetes changed the previously used term “relative hypoglycemia” to “pseudo- hypoglycemia” while defining symptoms of hypoglycemiawithout confirmatory low glucose values and failing to include falsely low readings of glucose on capillary blood samples(1,2). In the past, pseudo- hypoglycemiawas defined as a discrepancy between low capillary glucose and normal plasma glucose. We illustrate the current incongruity by reporting a case of a patient with Raynaud phenomenonwith falsely low capillary blood glucose measured by finger stick. A 75-year-old female with esophageal cancer post esophagectomywas found to have repeated asymptomatic low finger-stick blood glucose values varying from 11 to 53 mg/dL that were treated …