Where have I been?

I've been pursing higher education at a University in Boston for the past year! During my time in the academic world, there have been a lot of advances in the field! I don't quite know all of them because I'm not as in the loop anymore, but I heard AADE and ADA were amazing this year.

Connecting meters to iPhones... now that's cool. It's about time the industry gets with the technology of the times.

Anyways, as all of you have noticed, I haven't been posting much, and probably won't really. But that doesn't mean I'm going to dissapear altogether. Just for the time being. =)

New Tubeless Pump, New iPhone App!

Not to steal Amy's thunder or anything... but there are some pretty cool new things coming out this AADE:

The Solo™ MicroPump Insulin Delivery System is a new tubeless insulin dispensing patch. There were 2 new features that I thought were particularly notable. One is the ability to disconnect any time. So no more wasted patches and insulin. The other is the ability to bolus with patch buttons. So you don't end into a medical emergency every time your remote is not handy. I know that this is one of the reasons why some people turned down the original OmniPod, so maybe Solo might have a better shot!

The WaveSense Diabetes Manager™ iPhone/iPod Touch app is a digital logbook that makes full use of the apple interface. From what I've heard about it, a ton of the development was focused around user experience. Currently, numbers have to be entered manually, but automatic data transfer is on its way. You can go to http://www.wavesense.info/iphone and sign up to be one first to test it and help shape its development!

Well... it's almost time to start packing for AADE! Who's going this year?

14K Tests at the Same Moment!

The fine folks at TuDiabetes.com have organized a day for everyone to test at the same time!

Around July 14, we will be very close (or past) our 10K members milestone. By now, EsTuDiabetes, our sister community in Spanish, has passed 4,000 members. 10,000+4,000 makes a whopping 14,000 people.... 14,000 people that can all test their blood sugar at the same time and post it here.

We hope to see most readings posted at 4 pm ET on July 14. If you are a few minutes late, however, or are able to post your blood sugar reading earlier or later that day, it’s OK. The whole point is raising awareness about testing your blood sugars regularly.

If YOU don’t have diabetes, just tell someone who does to test and share on July 14.

Find it here.

I'm sure this will help raise awareness of the prevalence of diabetes!

2 Days Until...

It's 1:51am right now and I'm frantically packing for the ADA 2009 Scientific Sessions conference in New Orleans this weekend. Now that would be normal if I wasn't also simultaneously packing for ENDO 2009 in D.C. right after, or moving out of my room since someone will be moving into it while I'm gone. Yes... things are mad hectic right now. And on top of that, I spent my birthday (yesterday) stressing about all of this!

Phew.... ok, time to keep packing and packing up stuff... the cab comes in 5 hours!

By the way, will any of you be at the ADA this weekend?

If so, come visit me at the WaveSense booth! I promise to hook you up with some free... pens! hahaha...

Jazz

What's with all that Jazz?

More to come... I promise!

(I know... this is a very lame first post after a 2-month hiatus)

It's Not Your Life.

No amount of blogging on my part can compare to hearing it straight from a kid with diabetes.



Thanks to Joseph for not allowing diabetes to define who you are.
Thanks to Sandra for showing us what it means to love a child with diabetes.

Do you have Time for World Diabetes Day?

Well, in honor of World Diabetes Day I've decided to finally post after a 3-month hiatus. I've been so busy these days I haven't had time to post.

But then again, I should NOT be complaining.

Here's some simple math that helps me put things into perspective...

How much time might someone with type 1 diabetes spend on just the TESTING part of managing diabetes?

Average Total Test Time: 2+ minutes (looking for the kit, pulling out the meter, inserting test strip, pricking finger, waiting on test, clean up, and assuming there are no errors and they have a newer meter)

Average # of tests: 8+ (morning, pre-breakfast, post-breakfast, pre-lunch, post-lunch, pre-dinner, post-dinner, bedtime)

2 minutes x 8 times = 16 minutes per day

365 days x 16 minutes = 5,840 minutes

5,840 minutes / 60 minutes in an hour = 97 hours

97 hours / 24hr days = 4 DAYS

So in an entire year, a person with type 1 diabetes who actively manages their diabetes might spend at least 4 FULL DAYS simply TESTING for their glucose levels.

OR...

97 hours / 8hr work days = 12 full work days

Imagine spending over 2 weeks of full-time work simply testing yourself every 2 minutes. That's the amount of testing that they endure over the year.

So the next time someone says that diabetes is no big deal, ask them if pricking themselves for 4 days straight isn't a big deal... and that's not even including all the insertion time, pump operation time, medical visit time, carb-calculating time, blog reading time and worrying time.

So those of you who don't have diabetes better recognize... especially on World Diabetes Day!