From http://www.hoinews.com/sports/sports_story.aspx?id=160373
Heart of Illinios fans got a real Olympic thrill this past weekend cheering on Team USA to a pair of volleyball wins over Spain. The American volleyball team put on a high-flying highlight show in front of red,white and blue fans at U.S. Cellular Coliseum in 3-0 and 3-1 wins over Spain. While area fans were wowed by powerful spikes and precision passes, few of the fans realized one of the American players has type 1 Diabetes.
Kevin Hansen is headed to his first Olympics as a 26 year-old setter from Newport Beach, California. The former Stanford star was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes as a ten year-old. His status now as an Olympic athlete makes him a great role model for others with juvenile diabetes. A role model Heart of Illinois fans are hoping will soon be wearing a gold medal!
July 17, 2008
T1 at the Olympics
I'll miss Gary Hall Jr. but the USA will have a T1 athlete at the games.
From The News Wire: Biodel Trials
DANBURY, Conn., July 16 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Biodel Inc. NASDAQ: BIOD today announced that its two pivotal Phase III VIAject(TM) clinical trials are now complete, with the last study patient visit on July 14, 2008. Results of the full trial will be released either at Biodel's poster presentation at the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD) on Tuesday, September 9, 2008, or at a later appropriate scientific forum.
More at:
http://sev.prnewswire.com/health-care-hospitals/20080716/NYW13316072008-1.html
July 16, 2008
Caveat Lector
"Let the reader beware."
I am warming you up with a little Latin on purpose. Not to make me look smart, although if it does that is awesome, because I usually don’t look all that smart. I figure you know that.
I assume everyone reading anything I write knows to beware because I wrote it, but I am not talking about just my silly stuff. Get this: You can’t believe everything you read, in a book, in the newspaper or even on the Internet. That is good advice, particularly for the science-like stuff. I am not saying don’t read it. On the contrary I think it is very important to read stuff if for no other reason than so that you learn to get a feel for the good, the bad and the ugly.
I post a lot of stuff under the tag “From the Newswire.” I post stuff that I find interesting. A lot of it, as some of my fellow bloggers are kind enough to point out is pie in the sky small study stuff . I think it good to stay current and staying current is how one develops an appropriate BS sensor.
A lot of reporting and reporting based on other reporters reports no what they read and maybe didn't really understand falls into a trap of over simplification. Sadly folks can buy into that over simplification and hold it dear. I think the best way of avoiding that trap is reading a lot and being both curious and skeptical.
“Diabetes” is a trap. The press doesn’t know the difference between T1 and T2 any better than most of us did before diagnosis. There is lots of reporting that would be a lot better if it made the distinction. In point of fact we can all benefit from more accuracy.
Not that I am all that accurate myself. This site isn’t YT1DMV. Mostly because it sounds stupid and isn't a ridiculously simple play on the ever popular Your Mileage May Vary. So here I am ranting about what the press calls diabetes and I am guilty of the same at my own site.
We all know the T1 T2 particular lack of accuracy but what about the others. Say a book on how a low to no carb diet is really the key in diabetes (pick a type) control or the study of say vitamin D.
Here is a wonderful article that goes into great detail on study from which all those vitamin D articles sprung. (By the way the articles uses actual Latin to look smart.) Hopefully we were all taking them with a grain of salt to start with.
So what is the Latin for: Look out for simple answers to a complex problems?
I am warming you up with a little Latin on purpose. Not to make me look smart, although if it does that is awesome, because I usually don’t look all that smart. I figure you know that.
I assume everyone reading anything I write knows to beware because I wrote it, but I am not talking about just my silly stuff. Get this: You can’t believe everything you read, in a book, in the newspaper or even on the Internet. That is good advice, particularly for the science-like stuff. I am not saying don’t read it. On the contrary I think it is very important to read stuff if for no other reason than so that you learn to get a feel for the good, the bad and the ugly.
I post a lot of stuff under the tag “From the Newswire.” I post stuff that I find interesting. A lot of it, as some of my fellow bloggers are kind enough to point out is pie in the sky small study stuff . I think it good to stay current and staying current is how one develops an appropriate BS sensor.
A lot of reporting and reporting based on other reporters reports no what they read and maybe didn't really understand falls into a trap of over simplification. Sadly folks can buy into that over simplification and hold it dear. I think the best way of avoiding that trap is reading a lot and being both curious and skeptical.
“Diabetes” is a trap. The press doesn’t know the difference between T1 and T2 any better than most of us did before diagnosis. There is lots of reporting that would be a lot better if it made the distinction. In point of fact we can all benefit from more accuracy.
Not that I am all that accurate myself. This site isn’t YT1DMV. Mostly because it sounds stupid and isn't a ridiculously simple play on the ever popular Your Mileage May Vary. So here I am ranting about what the press calls diabetes and I am guilty of the same at my own site.
We all know the T1 T2 particular lack of accuracy but what about the others. Say a book on how a low to no carb diet is really the key in diabetes (pick a type) control or the study of say vitamin D.
Here is a wonderful article that goes into great detail on study from which all those vitamin D articles sprung. (By the way the articles uses actual Latin to look smart.) Hopefully we were all taking them with a grain of salt to start with.
So what is the Latin for: Look out for simple answers to a complex problems?
July 15, 2008
Scott's got a good read
Well I spent the time I should have writing, reading Scott's blog. It is on the topic of T1 and T2. Very good. Good links.
Not the usual why are the called the same thing but rather a good look at how they are not the same. I can't recommend it enough.
http://sstrumello.blogspot.com/2008/07/new-research-clarifies-distinction.html
July 13, 2008
LYMI Kel
I like branding. Who else has a brand like BadShoe for their family? It’s on polo shirts, luggage, messenger bags, pins etc. Given that it seems odd that I hadn’t come up with anything for YDMV.
Kelley, our oldest DD and resident media critic, and I had played around with some ideas but none really took hold. Kelley is pretty good. She made our walk graphics and she did the Disney With Diabetes castle of diabetes stuff for us last year. She didn’t like it but we love it and had fun with it at FFL last year.
She and I played with pumps and meters with YDMV on the display, various font based ideas and a bunch of others.
Yesterday I dusted off a few of the logo attempts and more or less settled on the idea but I was struggling with how to manipulate stuff on the screen. She took about 5 minutes to rebuild the thing.
Anyway we both liked the idea that there is a center line that runs though YDMV. At first you may not see that center line. Like a life with diabetes stuff bounces around it. The lower case d provided better visual balance kind of points out that a d low is a different thing all together.
Kelley left for a month of summer film school at NYU today. We are all very excited for her. The film school at NYU’s Tisch School of Art is her dream. She is up there living her dream.
Miss ya already Kelley – LYMI.
Kelley, our oldest DD and resident media critic, and I had played around with some ideas but none really took hold. Kelley is pretty good. She made our walk graphics and she did the Disney With Diabetes castle of diabetes stuff for us last year. She didn’t like it but we love it and had fun with it at FFL last year.
She and I played with pumps and meters with YDMV on the display, various font based ideas and a bunch of others.
Yesterday I dusted off a few of the logo attempts and more or less settled on the idea but I was struggling with how to manipulate stuff on the screen. She took about 5 minutes to rebuild the thing.
Anyway we both liked the idea that there is a center line that runs though YDMV. At first you may not see that center line. Like a life with diabetes stuff bounces around it. The lower case d provided better visual balance kind of points out that a d low is a different thing all together.
Kelley left for a month of summer film school at NYU today. We are all very excited for her. The film school at NYU’s Tisch School of Art is her dream. She is up there living her dream.
Miss ya already Kelley – LYMI.
July 12, 2008
July 10, 2008
Dex on Ping / Pod
Some of the questions in To Ping or not to Ping had to do with how the integration of the Dexcom CGM will work with Animas’ future pump. While Animas is not offering up any particulars the other side of the relationship is. And they are also talking about how it will work with the Pod.
Thanks to the good folks at Thomson Financial and Voxant we can see what DexCom, Inc. had to say at the Citigroup Healthcare Conference this year.
The full transcript is here.
Well that sort of sheds some light. Maybe what is what is in the slightly larger Ping case is the DexCom stuff.
But that was before the Ping introduced the idea of a controller like meter / remote like the Omni Pods with a traditional pump. So maybe it doesn’t shed much light other than we shouldn't expect to carry a DexCom receiver.
Thanks to the good folks at Thomson Financial and Voxant we can see what DexCom, Inc. had to say at the Citigroup Healthcare Conference this year.
Technology integration partnerships -- in January of this year, we announced two separate partnerships, one with Animas Corporation, a J&J subsidiary, and one with Insulet Corporation. In each of these arrangements, we would seek to develop an integrated insulin pump CGM system. What that will entail embedding our proprietary software and hardware design into the Animas pump in the case of Animas, or into the Insulet PDA in the case of Insulet. That will allow the user to display CGM data on the screen of their pump or their PDA. This results in the elimination of the patient having to carry a separate DexCom receiver, but it will retain all of the same functionality within those devices.
The full transcript is here.
Well that sort of sheds some light. Maybe what is what is in the slightly larger Ping case is the DexCom stuff.
But that was before the Ping introduced the idea of a controller like meter / remote like the Omni Pods with a traditional pump. So maybe it doesn’t shed much light other than we shouldn't expect to carry a DexCom receiver.
July 9, 2008
Go Read CWD, It's Shorter There
There is an interesting thread over on the Children with Diabetes forums, well OK there are often many interesting threads at CWD, but this one in particular got me thinking.
I tend to get long winded when thinking. - You probably know that.
Anyway the tread is titled The child or parents choice. It is about who chooses to go on the pump particularly for 8 and younger kids. I recommend you go read it and join in.
Naturally it got me to thinking about why we put our 8 year old on a pump and how that decision happened. It was really quite simple. We put an 8 year old on a pump because her brother was on one and she wanted too.
A lot of her experiences with diabetes have kind of been monkey see monkey do. I mean that in a loving way - honest.
I often feel a little like if she was destined for diabetes Connor had to get it first to show her the ropes. He is that good of an influence. (Don't worry he is at camp and won't read this and get a swelled head.)
For the first few days after she was diagnosed (by us in Disney World) she was into it. She was doing blood test and she doing her own shot in no time. She was, in her words, “in the diabetes club.” That didn’t last too long, reality hit home but it sure helped us get past our shock of a second diagnosis.
I can say first hand from that experience that a second diagnosis is no less emotionally devastating than the first. You just know what to do about it.
Where was I? Oh yeah pumps.
The kids didn’t start pumping at the same time. Yet once he choose to pump, the die was cast for her as well.
We felt that Connor’s transition to pumping was an important opportunity to help him take a step toward independence. Independent diabetes care has been our goal since the first days of Connor’s diabetes. Melissa and others beat it into us.
Interestingly the same internet friend helped us at the points of diagnosis and choosing to pump. This is the kind of friend who knows you need a laugh around about the second day after diagnosis. So he wrote us about his type 1 and making shooters from needles as a kid, you know an irresponsible influence.
We met this internet friend face to face at a fireworks party in Epcot a few days after diagnosing Delaney. It was an Ice Cream party. He had on pump. He sat down with Connor and talked at length about both ice cream and pumps.
Connor was sold. “All the Ice Cream you want dad, you just push a button!”
So my deal with Connor was that he had to learn how the pump worked and pass the written test at Children’s Hospital. That is a lot to ask of a fifth grader but remember we are talking about “All the Ice Cream you want!”
A year later, Delaney was ready to pump. Monkey see Monkey do. She choose to pump too. She was in the second grade and I didn’t make her take the CHOP test. She had lived it watching Connor. She picked it up as fast as she picked up testing and shots.
Just like with self testing and self injecting there were bumps in the road. Reality set in - in the form of set changes. Fortunately there was numbing cream.
I wrote that pumps are not about insulin infusion. They are about holistically improving the quality of life for families dealing with type 1 diabetes. Oddly that thread ended up talking about basal rates. OK I think I had a (big) Gin and Tonic that night. Good start, lousy ending.
In retrospect the single most useful part of out experience in moving to pumps wasn’t pumping. What was most significant was helping Connor and Delaney see that they could make diabetes life choices and they would be a big part of making those choices happen.
So my conclusion after all this long windedness is this: There is more long term value in letting the child choose to pump, to help them learn to start the mastery of their diabetes lives, to move to independence, than the huge value of pumping alone.
I tend to get long winded when thinking. - You probably know that.
Anyway the tread is titled The child or parents choice. It is about who chooses to go on the pump particularly for 8 and younger kids. I recommend you go read it and join in.
Naturally it got me to thinking about why we put our 8 year old on a pump and how that decision happened. It was really quite simple. We put an 8 year old on a pump because her brother was on one and she wanted too.
A lot of her experiences with diabetes have kind of been monkey see monkey do. I mean that in a loving way - honest.
I often feel a little like if she was destined for diabetes Connor had to get it first to show her the ropes. He is that good of an influence. (Don't worry he is at camp and won't read this and get a swelled head.)
For the first few days after she was diagnosed (by us in Disney World) she was into it. She was doing blood test and she doing her own shot in no time. She was, in her words, “in the diabetes club.” That didn’t last too long, reality hit home but it sure helped us get past our shock of a second diagnosis.
I can say first hand from that experience that a second diagnosis is no less emotionally devastating than the first. You just know what to do about it.
Where was I? Oh yeah pumps.
The kids didn’t start pumping at the same time. Yet once he choose to pump, the die was cast for her as well.
We felt that Connor’s transition to pumping was an important opportunity to help him take a step toward independence. Independent diabetes care has been our goal since the first days of Connor’s diabetes. Melissa and others beat it into us.
Interestingly the same internet friend helped us at the points of diagnosis and choosing to pump. This is the kind of friend who knows you need a laugh around about the second day after diagnosis. So he wrote us about his type 1 and making shooters from needles as a kid, you know an irresponsible influence.
We met this internet friend face to face at a fireworks party in Epcot a few days after diagnosing Delaney. It was an Ice Cream party. He had on pump. He sat down with Connor and talked at length about both ice cream and pumps.
Connor was sold. “All the Ice Cream you want dad, you just push a button!”
So my deal with Connor was that he had to learn how the pump worked and pass the written test at Children’s Hospital. That is a lot to ask of a fifth grader but remember we are talking about “All the Ice Cream you want!”
A year later, Delaney was ready to pump. Monkey see Monkey do. She choose to pump too. She was in the second grade and I didn’t make her take the CHOP test. She had lived it watching Connor. She picked it up as fast as she picked up testing and shots.
Just like with self testing and self injecting there were bumps in the road. Reality set in - in the form of set changes. Fortunately there was numbing cream.
I wrote that pumps are not about insulin infusion. They are about holistically improving the quality of life for families dealing with type 1 diabetes. Oddly that thread ended up talking about basal rates. OK I think I had a (big) Gin and Tonic that night. Good start, lousy ending.
In retrospect the single most useful part of out experience in moving to pumps wasn’t pumping. What was most significant was helping Connor and Delaney see that they could make diabetes life choices and they would be a big part of making those choices happen.
So my conclusion after all this long windedness is this: There is more long term value in letting the child choose to pump, to help them learn to start the mastery of their diabetes lives, to move to independence, than the huge value of pumping alone.
July 8, 2008
Transitions - Lemonade Life
Alison has a good topic over at Lemonade Life about transitioning from home to college. She is going to be on chat at Diabetes Talk Fest on the topics of Transitioning to Independence: Driving, Drinking and Dorms. That promises to be a good one for parents and maybe better for teens. Check it out.
Why Buy into Pumping
Not the idea of pumping Better is Better makes that case brilliantly. (5/16 editor note: Better is Better link has gone dead see the book.)
Why buy them?
In the next 4 years there will be a wholesale change in the insulin pump world. We have to be excited that the rate of change is accelerating. (See calculus geeks, we can love that second derivative too.) There is a lot of talk of more pod like products coming down the road. Amy has written about two, the nano pump and the behind the glass (you can't take a picture of it Amy!) MiniMed wearable pump prototype. MM would like us to believe that it is coming by 2010. NIH is sponsoring talks on the closed loop. The CGM market is expected by some to exceed the pump market in the coming years.
OK! OK! I know it isn't all roses, there were those who thought the Bong was a good idea too. Cool as it all may be it isn't Really Cool.
So why do we buy the actual pump? Is ownership the best financial model and if so who is it best for, patients, vendors or insurance companies?
Maybe we should lease them. It works for cars and office equipment.
Maybe we should rent pumps or as in the Omni Pod model throw them out with every set change. In the current buy-for-a-four-year-commitment we get stuck in a technological time-warp for 4 years. Unless we upgrade and upgrades are not typically covered by insurance. Even with insurance diabetes isn't cheap.
Anyone keep a cell phone for four years? I didn't think so. And no matter what any teen says, a cell phone isn't life saving technology.
About that insurance, the insurance company pays a large up front fee for a product it is betting will work for the patient. It may it may not. If the pump doesn’t work in a patients life style, it sits on a shelf un-used for years. The insurance company has already paid for all 4 years.
Renting or leasing would get rid of that big bump up front for the insurance company (OMG I just made a suggestion to save an insurance company money - hell must have frozen over.) If the lease term was less than 4 years pump patients could benefit from advancing technology faster.
The Pod people have an interesting model going. Every time you toss out a pod it is an opportunity to upgrade the functionality of the product. They have a lower up front cost but as I understand it have higher cost of consumables. This lowers the cost of entry that is good for expanding the market even with insurance. (Can you say lower co-pay?)
Lowering the barrier for entry also raises the need for customer service because changing becomes cheaper. If you read their conversations with the financial press (I do - so I must have no life) you will see that the Pod People are very aware of the importance of customer service. I have to think that people with diabetes can only benefit from increasing the priority of service.
Don't get me wrong, I am not saying service is bad in the pump business. Animas has provided great service from day 1. Yet regular YDMV readers know I still beat the heck out of them. We're talking about two of my kids' lives here - no good deed goes unpunished, sorry Audrey.
New business models would give the traditional pump users the opportunity to take advantage of new products faster. I would expect that there would higher consumable cost or possibly recognition (a word that here means benefit to the consumer) of the annuity value of consumables as part of the user / manufacturer relationship.
Hello? Insurance dudes? You can innovate and be creative - life isn't all actuarial calculations and denial letters.You can be part of a brave new world! Step up and create a pump rental payment plan.
If we are moving to more pod-like experiences where the technology is the consumable, why root the traditional pump in a different, traditional 4 year user cycle? In a YDMV world some folks are gonna like traditional pumps. Why can't they benefit from innovative business models as well as innovative technology too? Why do we have to wait for more pod people to land before overhauling the sales and service space?
So my YDMV friends, which is more innovative, the wear the pod pump or the business model that shortens the technology cycle for pump patients?
ps. Amy had a post on renting here. Thanks for pointing that out Amy.
Subscribe to:
Posts
(
Atom
)
Posts
