10,950 FINGER PRICKS LATER

Words by Rossana L. Unson

I’ve been an insulin-dependent diabetic for over three decades now. I say this with a hint of pride because the path that’s taken me to where I am today has been far from easy. The pandemic and subsequent quarantine have been difficult for everyone, but more so for us high-risk people with chronic diseases. The paralysis from doing anything that may jeopardize our already precarious health condition is real. I don’t particularly enjoy being dependent on anyone for my care, especially since I am of the view that no one else is responsible for my condition but myself. However, there have been days when I’ve felt a colossal disappointment in what seems like snail’s pace developments in Diabetes Care.

To manage my diabetes, I have to check my glucose before each meal. I follow a scale provided by my doctor of how much insulin to inject based on my glucose levels. That’s 3 finger-prick tests a day. Plus the insulin injections. 1,095 finger pricks a year or 10,950 times in the past ten years. I haven’t even counted the insulin shots yet. That’s A LOT OF PAIN, and pain is something you never get used to.

When I was first diagnosed, I scoured newspapers and magazines almost daily, wishing and hoping for new developments in Diabetes Care. Each time I find something, I’d excitedly show it to my endocrinologist, and she’d just calmly nod her head and say, “In ten years. In ten years, that will be approved.“

Ironically, it was only last year, precisely in the middle of a pandemic, that I finally got some sense of progress being made in the management of this disease.

I read in the news that there was a device available that promised a pain-free and quick way to check glucose levels. I was skeptical since I’d read of various devices that had eventually fallen by the wayside. Yet, the more I read about this new device, the more I was interested in trying it.

Fast forward to a few months after and, by this time of day, I’ve checked my glucose levels ten times since I woke this morning. This would have meant 10 glucose monitoring strips, 10 finger pricks, and 20 minutes of my day attending to diabetes-related activity. These finger pricks are no longer something I have to endure on a daily basis. In fact, I don’t feel any pain or discomfort when checking my glucose now.

I have a sensor attached to the back of my upper left arm. It comes with an applicator that makes it super quick and easy to apply. I bathe, exercise, and sleep with the sensor attached to my arm without any discomfort. Sometimes I actually forget I’m wearing it.

This sensor comes with a reader—quite similar to your regular glucose monitoring devices—that “scans” the sensor to provide me with my glucose levels in real-time.

To be able to check my glucose without having to take time with cotton, lancets, and the whole ceremony I need to go through when testing my glucose the old way can literally help me address hypoglycemia almost as it happens and without the added risk of contamination since I don’t need to set anything down on a table to take a test. Hypoglycemia is the sudden dip in glucose levels that cause people with diabetes to sweat, feel dizzy, have palpitations, and even go into a coma. Sometimes, these episodes come without warning and are accompanied by, what to me, are shameful seizures that make me feel weak and sick for hours after. Being able to check my glucose levels right away helps address this condition quickly. Hypoglycemia can be life-threatening and can cause serious irreparable damage to organs, not to mention what seizures do to our brain.

Now I just quickly scan to check if everything is alright. It doesn’t matter if I want to check once or one hundred times. It’s quick and painless. The result also includes arrows that tell me where my glucose is heading. Depending on where the arrow is pointing, it alerts me to the range of my next reading. Up, down, or straight, the arrow lets me know where my glucose is headed. This is something an ordinary finger-pricking device can’t do. The log-on reader provides my doctor a “map” so she can give me an accurate adjustment of my insulin dose after she reviews my results.

In the past, exercise has always been difficult as, naturally, I have this fear of having hypoglycemia during a workout. Exercise helps diabetics absorb insulin and, even if you do not have diabetes, exercise is still highly recommended to keep healthy. Now I exercise more and, this year, my resolution is to exercise regularly. I’m doing a lot of walking now, which helps control my blood sugar, and my reader comes right along with me. Knowing my levels in real-time helps me address whatever dips and rises occur in my blood sugar while I’m exercising.

In the long run, whatever I spend on Abbott’s FreeStyle Libre Flash Glucose Monitoring System, I will surely “save” with added years to my life and better health. The convenience and the simplicity of scanning the sensor without all the accompanying drama that checking my glucose used to entail whenever I needed to do it is priceless. You don’t know how many people I’d come across who would thoughtlessly remark how scary it was or how they didn’t want to look, or how some would even cringe. Definitely not one of the more enjoyable aspects of diabetes. Now people come up to me asking me what the sensor is. Sometimes, I’m tempted to tell them it’s my barcode, but most of the time, I’m excited to explain what it actually is.

There is no doubt that because of this flash glucose monitoring system, the race to search for new and better ways to manage Diabetes will be faster. Because of this huge step in Diabetes Management, and now that the number of my daily finger pricks is down to zero, I’m feeling so much more positive about my future as a diabetic—finally!

ABBOTT FREESTYLE LIBRE

FLASH GLUCOSE MONITORING SYSTEM

The Abbott FreeStyle Libre Flash Glucose Monitoring System is a continuous glucose monitoring system consisting of a handheld reader and a sensor.

The FreeStyle Libre Sensor is a small coin-sized device that can be easily attached to the back of the upper arm. It uses a thin, flexible filament inserted just under the skin to measure glucose every minute. It stores glucose readings every 15-minutes and has an 8-hour memory capacity. Weighing about 5g, it is powered by a silver oxide battery. It is water-resistant and can be worn continuously for up to 14-days.

The FreeStyle Libre Reader scans the sensor and displays the current glucose reading, the last 7 hours of glucose data, and a trend arrow to show where glucose levels are heading. It stores 90-days worth of data, which can be used to help in diabetes management.

The FreeStyle Libre Reader and the FreeStyle Sensor are priced at PHP3,500 each. These are available online through Lazada, Shopee, Watsons Online, and at selected leading Mercury drugstores nationwide.