Personalized medicine continues to grow in importance, and having the ability to monitor health data has proven to be a significant desire for people as the number of wearable devices continues to grow.
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Personalized medicine continues to grow in importance, and having the ability to monitor health data has proven to be a significant desire for people as the number of wearable devices continues to grow.
For diabetics, having a device that can track glucose levels and other factors in disease management can be a significant benefit. In September, digital health company One Drop stepped up its offerings by pairing its diabetes management monitoring system with the Apple Watch.
The pairing makes the One Drop system the only wireless blood glucose monitoring system to connect directly to Apple Watch. When announcing the partnership with the Apple device, One Drop said it continued to provide the “simplest, most elegant, and most accessible solutions” to support its customers and diabetes patients.
The move comes soon after One Drop and Companion Medical integrated their platforms to provide users with a more useful set of data on the app of their choice. The companies will now ship a One Drop | Chrome Bluetooth blood glucose meter with each eligible Companion Medical InPen at no additional cost to the user, they announced in August. Companion’s InPen is a smart insulin pen paired with an integrated diabetes management app.
In its latest announcement about the Apple Watch app, One Drop pointed to the rate of growth in Apple Watch users – many of whom access the smart watch’s ability for health management. Last year Apple Watch sales grew more than 10 percent and accounted for more than half of all smartwatch devices. In the second quarter of 2018, One Drop said Apple sold 4.7 million of its smartwatches. Which represents 17 percent of the global market.
“The marriage of One Drop | Mobile and Apple Watch allows users to accurately log, monitor, and share their diabetes data and import other biometric telemetry straight into One Drop to optimize their diabetes management,” One Drop said. The device is capable of capturing data from other systems, including the Apple HealthKit, Google Fit Fitbit, Dexcom, and Companion Medical’s InPen, among others.
In its announcement, One Drop said it is the first diabetes company to launch a companion app for the Apple Watch. Users can manually log blood glucose, food, medication, and exercise into the app. Additionally, users can also view daily stats and goals for diabetes management. One Drop also provides users with the option to seamlessly transfer blood glucose data from One Drop | Chrome directly to the Apple Watch companion app.
“For too long the diabetes industry has operated on point solutions and closed systems focused on the needs of healthcare providers in the clinic, rather than the needs of the people using the systems to manage their disease every day,” Jeff Dachis, chief executive officer of One Drop, said in a statement. “We are excited to further empower One Drop users with this exciting addition to the One Drop experience.”
One Drop isn’t the only wearable device aimed at managing diabetes. In May California-based LifePlus launched Lifeleaf, which it bills as the “world’s first non-invasive continuous blood glucose monitoring multi-sensor wearable device.” Lifeleaf is a smartwatch that continuously and non-invasively tracks major chronic health risks such as diabetes, cardiac arrhythmia, congestive heart failure, COPD, sleep apnea and hypertension. It is a cloud-based AI solution combined with a mobile app that provides cloud-based analytics with real-time notifications.
Another wearable glucose monitoring system is the Eversense Continuous Glucose Monitoring (CGM) system, which was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in June for diabetic patients 18 years of age and older. According to the company, the Eversense is the first FDA-approved CGM system to include a fully implantable sensor to detect glucose, which can be worn for up to 90 days.
In July, Abbott Laboratories was able to bring its FreeStyle Libre system to the United States. The glucose monitoring system, which has been available in Europe since 2014, allows diabetics to wear the device for up to 14 days for continuous glucose monitoring. Abbott said the FreeStyle Libre system is the “longest lasting self-applied personal glucose sensor available on the market.”
