Now! Know where your diabetic is at all times! (oh, yeah, and be able to continuously monitor glucose):

Verichip Corporation to Unveil Plans for Self-Contained Implantable RFID Glucose-Sensing Microchip

Similarly:

I did a little more research on the minimed continuous glucose monitoring system this morning and I’m still pretty intrigued. The thing is, I just can’t get the image of the omnipod as my new parasitic best friend out of my head… which, despite tubes, makes the minimed slightly more appealing.

It’s much smaller than the omnipod and still maintains that machine-like quality (unlike the omnipod, which I am convinced will make me feel rather bionic). Anyhoo -added to the winter break agenda now is visiting a couple of “drug” reps (pump reps?) to get the scoop on all they have to offer.

Get Pumped!

Pumping Enhances Quality of Life

Jan Chait
Both short-term and long-term quality of life are improved in people with type 1 diabetes who use an insulin pump.

Researchers in Chico, California, conducted a Web-based survey based on the Diabetes Control and Complications Trial quality-of-life questionnaire. The survey asked subjects to compare their previous injection therapy with pump therapy.

Among the findings from the 561 respondents (92 percent of whom were from the United States):

• A1C levels decreased in 77 percent of the respondents, regardless of how long they’d been pumping.
• Satisfaction with diabetes care and management was significantly greater.
• Respondents were nearly always, “almost always” or “considerably satisfied” with their diabetes treatment since the initiation of pump therapy.
• Personal satisfaction was significantly improved.
• For 81 percent of the respondents, their diet had become more flexible.
• Hypoglycemic episodes were experienced only occasionally or seldom.
• Respondents reported that diabetes had less negative impact on their lives.
• Respondents felt less concern about becoming unconscious.

The researchers speculate that the short-term enhancement in quality of life might result from the effectiveness of insulin pump therapy, whereas long-term enhanced quality of life could stem from a decreased risk of complications because of the lower A1Cs.

It’s been a decade and I can safely say that I am tired of living with “no strings attached.” I am moving pump-ward. However, having punned so well with the “strings” comment, I must admit that the pump I am in hot pursuit of is “wireless”: the omnipod.

“Omnipod”…

It sounds like its own little being… growing like a parasitic appendage from your abdomen…ok, so that was my immediate though, but I’m warming up to the idea (yes, of course I would name it, what around me does not get named and/or personified in some way, shape, or form?)

The only downside I foresee in comparing the omnipod with other pumps is that it can’t be as easily removed to switch between pump and injections… so we shall see -a large part of my heart still belongs to the minimed due to its partner in crime, the continuous glucose sensor (“Mom, Dad, I’m a real boy!” oh if only normal was so simple, Pinocchio).

HbA1C December 2007: 9.5%

HbA1C Summer 2007: 8.1%

So what, you might wonder, caused this dramatic increase in my hemoglobin A1C levels?

It’s quite simple: medical school. it takes no prisoners. none. nothing is spared.

Even though my boy and my doc claim to love me despite my numbers, I’m afraid I do not, so it is onward and forward I move with a new plan of action (pump-dom) and renewed diligence.

note:

[carbohydrate count = 1 unit: 10 carbs]

[current correction = 2 units:50mg/dL]