Continuous Glucose Monitoring: A Case Study for Commercializing Products In The Era of Patient-Driven Health Care

Article preview from IN VIVO- November 01, 2010

Continuous glucose monitoring for patients with diabetes presents an example of how an individual product has far less value than the integrated solution the technology enables. While continuous glucose monitoring offers significant value to a broad range of patients, the technology has still not fulfilled its market potential. Factors hindering more widespread adoption include inaccuracy, difficulty in using the systems, and low levels of patient adherence. But the greatest obstacle in CGM is the disconnect between CGM and treatment planning; CGM produces mounds of data that patients and even physicians don't know how to use. According to Health Care Advances, if this powerful dataset is optimized, shared, and applied, it could shift CGM from a niche product for a small number of type 1 diabetes patients into a standard of care for many metabolic diseases.

Continuous Glucose Monitoring: A Case Study for Commercializing Products In The Era of Patient-Driven Health Care

Article preview from Medtech Insight- November 01, 2010

Continuous glucose monitoring has yet to achieve its full potential. Over the five years that continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) has been available to patients, it has seen only modest uptake. Increased insurance coverage beginning in 2008 spurred the adoption of CGM in the US, leading to a global market of approximately $200 million in annual sales (2010 estimate) with over 150,000 type 1 patients owning a system. However, many hurdles to adoption still exist including product accuracy limitations, ease-of-use issues, and insufficient payor coverage. However, for patients who have successfully built CGM into their therapeutic plan, the results have been impressive. Patients are achieving glucose control and a quality of life that have been hard to attain for many years. So why is a technology that can have such a meaningful impact on some individuals gaining traction so slowly?

The current health care system has not yet evolved to the point where it can maximize the benefits of innovations that go by the various monikers "connected health," "wireless medicine," or "patient-centric" devices, designations for products that help patients manage their own chronic diseases on a daily basis. There are signs, however, that the system is poised to change. The convergence of several factors including better research tools, new diagnostics, Web 2.0 platforms, the move toward personalized medicine and outcomes-driven reimbursement will transform health care into a more patient-driven system. In the near future, therapy decisions won't rely wholly on scheduled visits to the physician's office; information tools will give patients a greater role. Instead of a system where physicians set doses that do not change between office visits, real-time adjustments will be possible. Patients will share treatment information with their selected networks and make informed decisions with their physicians for individualized treatment plans. CGM could flourish in a patient-driven system. Indeed, diabetes is perhaps the ideal condition in which to demonstrate the value of patient-driven health care, since patient involvement – through diet and exercise, daily blood glucose testing, and correctly timing the delivery of doses of insulin throughout the day – is the single most important contributor to success in diabetes care.

Continued...

To read this article in its entirety, Purchase now as a PDF and receive it immediately via email. Or get it FREE when you subscribe to Medtech Insight Newsletter.

About Medtech Insight

Medtech Insight newsletter provides insights into the technology and market developments (devices, instrumentation, biomaterials, gene therapy, tissue engineering, etc.) impacting a wide range of surgical and non-surgical clinical practices.

Plus:
To find out about more about more about Elsevier Business Intelligence's medical device publications and databases, multi-user access and/or advertising with Medical Devices Today, please contact Kristy Kennedy at (480) 985-9512