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New pill can deliver insulin

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Re: New pill can deliver insulin

#221

Post by georgebarnett »

daeken wrote: post #26
RPLong wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What doctors and researchers get wrong about diabetes is that pin-pricks and injections are not even remotely bad. I don't know a single diabetic who cares about injections and blood sugar tests. You get used to that within the first week of diagnosis. No, the unpleasant part of being diabetic is having to live every second of your life as an act of weighing how what you're currently doing is going to affect your blo…

> I don't know a single diabetic who cares about injections and blood sugar tests. I'm diabetic and the sole reason I don't check my blood sugar (unless I think something is drastically out of whack) is that it takes me upwards of 30 minutes to do a finger prick for testing. My anxiety skyrockets and nothing I do can tell me that it's not going to be excruciating. Most of the time I end up having my wife do it, which…

CGMs are great for this.

Also, try a Freestyle Libre. It’s closer in behaviour to a finger prick but still gives the trend info.

Re: New pill can deliver insulin

#222

Post by GiorgioG »

bigtunacan wrote: post #153
GiorgioG wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our 7 year old lays on top of his pump regularly when he sleeps and despite it making the entire pump way hotter than 80 degrees, it’s never caused any efficacy issues. He’s played soccer for 3+ hours in the 95+ degree heat (4 days in a row), no problems with the insulin on board.

From the context of your message, I think I correctly understood you to mean you have had no problems with the insulin that is in the insulin pump's infusion set reservoir? Trying to help and I don't want to come off as rude, so please forgive me in advance. The term "insulin on board" has a very specific meaning and it refers to the fast acting insulin that is currently in one's body and still active. So let us say…

You're right - I'm sorry, I shouldn't have been so careless with my words. What I meant was, we've never had a problem with the insulin in his pump's cartridge/reservoir even in 90+ degree heat for 3+ hours with him running and sweating.

Re: New pill can deliver insulin

#223

Post by nolok »

samcday wrote: post #4

> Once ingested, water dissolves a disk of sugar, using a spring to release a tiny needle made up almost entirely of freeze-dried insulin. The needle is injected into the stomach — which the patient can’t feel, owing to a lack of pain receptors in the stomach. Once the injection has occurred, the needle can break down in the digestive tract. That's some pretty impressive ingenuity. Also sounds kinda terrifying if the…

I can't help but smile at the idea of using sugar to deliver insulin

Re: New pill can deliver insulin

#224

Post by dotuser »

GordonS wrote: post #160
dotuser wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was on a CGM (Dexcom) for about 3 months until my new insurance would not cover it. Even though it's convenient, it comes with its own set of problems - having to restock every month (with copays) got tiring and somewhat expensive compared to strips. I also had false low reads a number of times. And the amount of wasted plastic (the applicator gun) is concerning if you are environmentally conscious. As for lancets,…

I had one of those for a while, and it does say you should only use each lancet once. Realistically, I don't know if there are any real risks to reusing them though?

I reuse them until it becomes mildly discomforting at which time I know the lancet has dulled. Of course AccuChek prefers that you use it once;)

Re: New pill can deliver insulin

#225

Post by Pharmakon »

hannasanarion wrote: post #142
Pharmakon wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a sugar pill, if the target eats candy or takes any other pill it would be doable. It would also be easy to slip into food. Liquid is easier, but will leave unavoidable forensic evidence. If making something look like natural causes even under extreme scrutiny is the goal, this is a hell of a way to do it.

How often do you swallow candy without chewing?

Yeah... that’s a good point. Candy is probably out, but with the number of supplements and pills people take, that’s probably easier. Then of course you have the challenge of accessing them at some point, but no one said that attempting an assassination like this would be easy. More of a problem would be that if it didn’t work, and was discovered, it would be very clear that a government or similarly powerful organization was involved.

So good for secrecy, bad for deniability. All told, strangling someone and making it look like a suicide, or “helping” someone make a jump is probably still simpler and safer.

Re: New pill can deliver insulin

#226

Post by westoncb »

RPLong wrote: post #16
samcday wrote: post #4

> Once ingested, water dissolves a disk of sugar, using a spring to release a tiny needle made up almost entirely of freeze-dried insulin. The needle is injected into the stomach — which the patient can’t feel, owing to a lack of pain receptors in the stomach. Once the injection has occurred, the needle can break down in the digestive tract. That's some pretty impressive ingenuity. Also sounds kinda terrifying if the…

What doctors and researchers get wrong about diabetes is that pin-pricks and injections are not even remotely bad. I don't know a single diabetic who cares about injections and blood sugar tests. You get used to that within the first week of diagnosis. No, the unpleasant part of being diabetic is having to live every second of your life as an act of weighing how what you're currently doing is going to affect your blo…

Completely agree.

Pin-pricks and injections aren't even on my radar; they're nothing at all next to the problems of needing to maintain at least some level of vigilance at near all times. Additionally, needing to constantly have plans for carrying around carbs, insulin, monitoring equipment, ensuring various prescriptions have refills and there will be pharmacies around, that the event you're attending has things you can eat, etc.—and still having periodic interruptions to whatever you're engaged in from lows or highs, or just needing to stop and check because it feels like you might be dropping low—that's the terrible stuff.

I have a hard time imagining how someone could even compare the small bother of injections to the above. I suppose if you're morbidly fearful of needles or something, but otherwise I'd be very confused at how a mild quick pain could match up to having your life dominated by this constant attention sink.

EDIT: I should also add: I got the FreeStyle Libre a couple months ago (it's effectively a CGM—or at least far far closer to the CGM side on a spectrum from finger-prick monitor to CGM), and it does help significantly with the attention problem.

And, I'm guessing how much the attention problem affects you depends on your personal standards for acceptable BG levels. I don't like how I feel when it's above 140 or so, and it's supposed to negatively effect cognitive performance to be too high, so my standards are very high (I've now had two doctors say I had the best A1c scores they'd seen).

Probably also depends on your inclination for analytical introspection / self-monitoring. I would bet I'd have ranked high on that even before the diabetes diagnosis, off-the charts high for several years after, and now, after spending years working on meditation etc.—moderately high.

Re: New pill can deliver insulin

#227

Post by ntdb »

tomca32 wrote: post #189
bojackstorkman wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most (maybe all?) CGMs need to be calibrated regularly with finger pricks. In fact in the case of both the Dexcom G5 (haven't known anyone on the G6) and Medtronic Guardian sensors they can occasionally sort of derp out and ask for multiple calibrations in a row for utterly mysterious reasons. I just asked and my partner says the most times she has had to test to get a Guardian sensor back to normal was seven times i…

Dexcom 6 doesn't need to be calibrated anymore. Well, it still needs the first calibration when you insert it, but none other than that. Lasts for some 2-3 weeks before sensor needs replacing.

The Dexcom G6 system does not require any calibration, insertion is remarkably pain-free, and it lasts for 10 days. I've had it for a few months (after a couple of years of using the G5 system) and I can't imagine living without it.

Re: New pill can deliver insulin

#228

Post by refurb »

gravity13 wrote: post #214
refurb wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Generic insulin is available at $25 per vial. Guess what? Nobody wants to use it because the next generation of insulins is better.

There isn't a generic insulin available (at least in the US) - that's why there's a movement of biohackers to homebrew insulin.

While not a true generic, Novo Nordisk does sell an old version of their insulin at Walmart for $25 a vial. About as close to a generic as you’re going to get.

Re: New pill can deliver insulin

#229

Post by refurb »

dsaavy wrote: post #220
refurb wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Generic insulin is available at $25 per vial. Guess what? Nobody wants to use it because the next generation of insulins is better.

As a type 1 diabetic, this isn’t remotely true for me. Novolog and its equivalents made timing impossible for peaks of insulin and food absorption. Also made low carb impossible due to the peak pattern of the insulin compared to digestion of low carb, high protein meals. Insulin pumps with combo boluses resulted in unpredictable absorption due to scar tissue from having low body fat percentage. Ended up switching bac…

Interesting!

What I’ve heard from other diabetics is that the older Novolin drugs take a lot more effort to get constant insulin levels than the newer ones.

I guess not true for everyone!!

Re: New pill can deliver insulin

#230

Post by maxander »

A potential huge impact of this advance is inspiring further research into peptide-based drugs; this is a whole new paradigm with the potential to be comparable or better than the small-molecule drugs we currently focus on, but the poor marketability of injections has kept most pharmaceutical companies from being very interested in them.
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