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FDA clears first over-the-counter continuous glucose monitor

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Re: FDA clears first over-the-counter continuous glucose monitor

#231

Post by pastor_bob »

illegalsmile wrote: post #209
jseliger wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Before I got cancer, I had one through Levels, and it was informative. Dessert is much worse than I'd thought. Rice, too, including brown rice. I remember eating some biryani and a small bit of naan at an Indian restaurant and thinking that I'd been pretty healthy, only to see a spike of like 80.

Desserts can definitely send your levels quite high but I don't think I'd qualify some biryani and naan with a reading of 80 as unhealthy. You probably ate a healthy portion and left it at that. Is 80 not well within the normal range?

He probably means it spiked 80 from where it was (e.g. 100 to 180)

Re: FDA clears first over-the-counter continuous glucose monitor

#232

Post by queuebert »

abletonlive wrote: post #222
queuebert wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think tearing apart a working airplane and putting it back together in order to inspect it between every flight is a safe practice? Did you see the 737 door plug accident? You are missing part of the picture here. And that part is not that everyone else is dumb but you.

> Do you think tearing apart a working airplane and putting it back together in order to inspect it between every flight is a safe practice? Do you think this is....the same thing as a continuous glucose monitor?

Mathematically, yes. The probabilities involved are different, however.

Re: FDA clears first over-the-counter continuous glucose monitor

#233

Post by mjaniczek »

mlsu wrote: post #15
coldpie wrote: post #3

I'm T1D (insulin-dependent). I used a Dexcom for a couple years a while ago, back around the G3 through G5 era or so. I ended up stopping using it because my diabetes is very well managed, and I found it didn't make a huge difference to my management. With my insurance, each new sensor every week cost about $50, and would fail in various annoying ways: sometimes it would just stop working in the middle of the week, o…

Dexcom and Freestyle both have options (G7, FSL2) that have a much narrower form factor than the old sensors. They end up being far more reliable, because the sensor doesn't dislodge. The new Dexcom sensors are more accurate. Less drift and no calibration. Out of pocket cost is obviously your own situation but I think anyone with T1 should look at them. For me they are life changing, even moreso if you have a pump th…

> life changing

Yeah, seeing ~300 datapoints a day instead of 4 while pricking your fingers is amazing QoL improvement. Dead serious.

Re: FDA clears first over-the-counter continuous glucose monitor

#234

Post by thecosas »

jonlucc wrote: post #183
thecosas wrote: post #164

T1D here who has been using Dexcom G6 for many years now. Interesting to see the differences between Stelo and G7 which are built on the same platform. Curious if anything is driving the increase in wear time other than battery life savings from reporting back fewer readings. CGM: G7 / Stelo Wear time: 10 / 15 days Time between readings: 5 / 15 minutes

I'm not sure how much I can say; I don't work for a CGM company, but my company is very interested in diabetes. There are non-device reasons you can't use a CGM indefinitely. The site becomes less reliable over time, and it varies from peron to person. I'm not sure if the Stelo has addressed any of those, or if the G7 was overly cautious, or something else, but there are biological things happening at the site that a…

Ah, that makes sense. I'm certain we'll never "know" but just found it interesting and was curious if people knew other trade-offs they may have been making for increased wear time, especially given that would offer a sharp reduction in cost over time for patients (and their insurance companies, etc).

A 50% increase in wear time is HUGE in my opinion.

Re: FDA clears first over-the-counter continuous glucose monitor

#236

Post by barbazoo »

philsnow wrote: post #30

I dove into CGMs a little bit about a year ago, mostly just for fun. Yes, I paid money to some online prescription mill for CGMs (Abbott Freestyle Libre 3, IIRC), and then put one in my arm (the applicator is a short syringe section that has the monitor tube threaded into it, so the tube stays in your arm and your skin under the monitor remains broken) for a couple weeks. Just to see how various foods would affect my…

What symptoms would one have to present for an "online prescription mill"/"virtual care provider" to prescribe a CGM? I'm fascinated by this and would love to try it out but I don't want to bother my family doctor with this.

Re: FDA clears first over-the-counter continuous glucose monitor

#237

Post by thecosas »

dddiaz1 wrote: post #41

Great to see it be OTC. But it's weird that it is advertised to last for 15 days, while the prescription version for T1ds/T2ds only lasts for 10 days. The hardware looks the same.

Had the same thought! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39621575

Also... does this mean they are direct-to-consumer as well as retail channels? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39622192

Re: FDA clears first over-the-counter continuous glucose monitor

#238

Post by apatheticonion »

I currently sticky-tape my Fitbit Inspire 3 to my tricep to get continuous low effort health/sleep tracking.

I used sticky tape as an experiment because there are no arm bands for Fitbit products. That was a year and a half ago and have worn it like that every day since.

I can't wait until trackers can be implanted under the skin, track blood glucose, and improved accuracy.

Let's gooooo

Re: FDA clears first over-the-counter continuous glucose monitor

#239

Post by Engineering-MD »

itpragmatik wrote: post #51
philsnow wrote: post #30

I dove into CGMs a little bit about a year ago, mostly just for fun. Yes, I paid money to some online prescription mill for CGMs (Abbott Freestyle Libre 3, IIRC), and then put one in my arm (the applicator is a short syringe section that has the monitor tube threaded into it, so the tube stays in your arm and your skin under the monitor remains broken) for a couple weeks. Just to see how various foods would affect my…

At least for me the readings that it shows are not accurate (when verified with old style finger pricking glucose monitoring machine). These CGMs are good for knowing the general variability of glucose level in your blood based on your diet exercise etc; I don’t trust the absolute numbers from CGM like Freestyle Libre - haven’t used any other one though yet.

There is generally a latency of a few minutes between blood and interstitial fluid (the CGM) readings- up to 15 minutes. You may find if you account for latency your consistency between the two increases

Re: FDA clears first over-the-counter continuous glucose monitor

#240

Post by UI_at_80x24 »

It's worth mentioning that in Canada, you do not require a prescription to get a CGM. However only the Abbot Freestyle Libre series is available here. It cost ~$100 and last 2 weeks.

I've found it to be mostly accurate.

Placing it on the back of the arm was always a problem for me, it was constantly getting knocked/pulled, and otherwise disturbed. I had to buy adhesive patches that covered the entire unit. I later discovered that another decent place to apply them in on my chest between my collar-bone and shoulder-joint but lower (towards the nipple). I always had decent reliability/accuracy there. It also hurt less (from the adhesive) then on the back of the arm.

Having a CGM is amazing, and if you have medical coverage that will pay for it then you should get it.

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