Latest diabetes management technology
Hardly a month goes by without the media covering some new study showing the importance of keeping blood glucose levels as close to normal levels as possible. And, hardly a month goes by that there isn’t some new technology to help people with diabetes in the never-ending and exhausting work of keeping their blood glucose levels as close to normal as possible. Continuous glucose monitors are all the rage right now and I can personally attest to the value of these products, despite their quirks, shortcomings, and expense.
This month’s offering in diabetes management technology is from Philips, a company I personally worked for back in the late 1990’s. They’ve got an idea for a non-invasive blood glucose monitor.
Quite a few companies have bravely ventured into the arena of non-invasive BG monitors. There have been a couple that have had non-invasive products make their way into the market — the Glucowatch comes to mind here — but it is difficult to say that any have been successful, at least not yet. Most past attempts have focused on using some kind of laser or light beam of some kind to detect the spectroscopic signature of glucose. As if this wasn’t difficult enough to do, it’s made more complicated by the unfortunate fact that there are other substances in our bodies with similar spectroscopic signatures. If you’re interested in the gritty details of non-invasive blood glucose detection, I suggest these for some light reading:
- Overview of Non-Invasive Optical Glucose Monitoring Techniques
- Raman spectroscopy for measurement of blood analytes
Those clever engineers at Philips are pursuing a non-invasive device to measure blood glucose levels by taking a sample of exhaled breath. A few years ago, scientists discovered a correlation between blood glucose levels and the amount of carbon monoxide in the air we breathe out and that’s the basis of their work. For the sake of all people with diabetes, I wish those people at Philips the best of luck and I hope I will soon be seeing their product on the market.
For details on this announcement, see Diabetes Breath Test and the glucose breath test patent application.
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