Animas gets warning letter from the FDA

It looks like on December 27, 2011, Animas was sent a warning letter from the FDA. It complained that Animas didn’t report within 30 days an event of a device failure that led to the death or serious injury of a patient. It also complained that the OneTouch Ping and 2020 insulin pumps were still being sold, even though a few failed. Scary.

I want!

So, I found the next diabetes toy that I would like to try. It is the newest glucometer by LifeScan called Verio IQ.

According to the ad on the website, “Introducing the first meter ever that looks for patterns of highs and lows – and alerts you right on screen, when it finds one. So you don’t have to do all the work for a change.” If it actually works as advertised — Yay!

Looking at pictures on other blogs who have reviewed it, I think it looks pretty cool. Bad points: It looks like it doesn’t use the One Touch Ultra strips. (all my current meters use those strips.)

So, I haven’t touched one of these meters, so I can’t tell you if it is cool or not. But, I am looking forward to when it comes out so I can try it.

These blogs are where I heard about it first:

Continuous Glucose Monitor and me…part 3

Medtronic's CGMS

“What is that beeping sound? It is very annoying.”

That was one of the comments of one of the Brownie Girl Scouts in my troop. I had to agree, it was very annoying. It was my pump – beeping at me again. Actually, it was the CGM part of my pump. As I mentioned in other posts, I do like the CGM, but I find it awfully needy. (So needy that I stopped using it for a while because the beeping was driving me crazy.)

It beeps when it needs another meter reading for calibration of it’s data. It beeps when it loses signal from the sensor. It beeps when the sensor is done. It beeps with a high blood sugar. It beeps with a low blood sugar. This time, it was thinking that I was having a low blood sugar. Since I just had a cupcake to correct a low, I checked my blood sugar with my meter. Luckily I double checked with my meter, because the CGM was WAY off. My blood sugar was actually high from me over correcting.

In general, I find that the CGM is mostly accurate. But, on days when I have the wildest swings in blood sugar, those are the days that it is the least accurate. Of course, it is the days with the big swings that I need the most accuracy. Well, honestly, I want accuracy every day.

cold glucometer

I live in an area with seasons. There is a hot season and a cold season. Right now we are in the cold season. Honestly, this season hasn’t been so bad. It has been temperatures above freezing for most of the winter. But, here comes the freeze. Freezing brings about other problems for me. First, I have to make sure my insulin pump stays warm. Insulin stops working if it freezes, and it can freeze just as well in a pump. That is easy to prevent, I just attach the pump to my underwear so it is right next to my body. If it can get cold enough to freeze in that location, I have a lot more problems 🙂

The next problem is my glucometer. I have discovered in previous winters that the meter doesn’t work when it too cold. Luckily, my meter gives a warning when it is too cold, so I don’t get faulty readings. (According to the manual, my meter doesn’t work any lower than 43 degrees Fahrenheit.) But, I still am not getting any readings with a cold meter. That has caused problems and I have had to guess if I was going low or not. I wasn’t always right.

If I remember, I try to keep my meter in my pants pocket when I go out in the cold to keep it warm. But, that method doesn’t seem to work that well to warm the meter after it is already cold. The woman behind the Pump Wear company happened to post some solutions to the cold meter problem a couple of days ago.

Continuous Glucose Monitor and me…part 2

Medtronic's CGM

This is part 2 of my discussion of the Medtronic CGM. This post is devoted to one of my least favorite warning signals — the weak signal warning.

The weak signal warning shows up when the pump is having trouble reading the transmitter. It is an important alarm. But, it seems that the transmitter is not very strong at all.

If I go to the gym (which is one of the more important places where I would want the CGM to work), I have to make sure my pump is as close to the transmitter as possible. I guess all the electronic equipment at the gym causes problems. Ugh.

I could live with that — but it also has problems in computer labs. Well, since I teach in computer labs, you can see that it would be important to me. Grrr.

Well, how about at home? It seems if my pump goes underneath me (when sleeping for example), it also gets a weak signal. Blah!

Now, if you look at the documentation, it would seem that a weak signal wouldn’t cause that much of a problem. It claims that it keeps up to 40 minutes of data which it would upload once it gets the signal. But, in my pump that isn’t the way it works. If it loses signal for more than 15 minutes, (and then get it back) it then goes back in the “Start” sequence. That means up to 2 hours of no glucose readings. Then it will need to be re-calibrated, again.

Perhaps it acts wacky because I have a Paradigm 722 and not a Revel. I really hope so.

 

Continuous Glucose Monitor and me…part 1

iPro, after insertion - looks like the regular CGM sensor

I’ve been using my continuous glucose monitor again. I stopped when I was working because it was beeping at me way too much. It either needed to be calibrated, or lost signal and was very insistent that I do something about it. But, it is break, so I am starting up again.

If you don’t know, I am using a Medtronic Continuous Glucose monitor. When it is working, it is amazing. I have found many times with problem blood sugar and didn’t know about. I have to say that I would much rather have it than not have it. These are just some of my issues.

Issue one: Where to connect the sensor. You have to insert a sensor into your body in an area with fat. Medtronic has a page with the suggested sites — right here. It looks like quite a few sites, but for me it is a lot less. I can’t have it under my navel, since that area tends to rub against clothing. Also, I tend to bleed (a lot) when items are placed there. (Yep, I have inserted at the right angle. For some reason that area is not good for me.). I don’t have a lot of fat on my legs, and I can’t bend well enough to put it on my butt. So, that just leaves the area on my belly above my navel. But, it also needs to be 2 inches away from my insulin pump site, which reduces the location even more. What I need is a shorter needle/sensor. That would add more places for me to use.

On a slightly different note, Abby posted at Six Until Me about her experience doing the closed loop clinical trial. See here for the post. I found it quite interesting. I’m wondering how much the closed system would help my issues.