Bluetooth from transmitter to full function iphone app. Dexcom doesn’t need to be in the receiver business.
Bluetooth from sensor to remote pump (duh). Might convince me to go to pump.
Longer life/less expensive sensors.
Fully disablable/infinitely customizable alerts.
Yours?
Forget the first two! FDA approves the system as a whole, and having a trasmitter “talk” over BT to something else is very unlikely to happen. On the other hand, BT in the receiver talking to anything else would not be too difficult to implement, and would not need any specific FDA approval…
Longer life sensors? I’ve done 3 weeks with one, and 2 weeks almost each and every time. FDA says 1 week max, but I get the best readings from my Dexcom at the beginnning of week 2, typically. Less expensive is a matter of market adoption and competition.
The alerts can be changed fairly easily, but I understand your need for more granular control. Something I don’t need at this time.
My wish list stops at the things that I can do while using Islet on my iPhone:
I use it to log every insulin shot I take, including insulin type, and also when I start with a new insulin pen and new sensor, so I can keep track of how many supplies I need when travelling.
Also, timezone support will be nice to have.
But so far, after 6 months with the Dexcom, I am quite happy with the way it is, to tell you the truth.
Ciao, Luca
Personally, I like having a receiver. It’s something I can put in my shirt pocket and easily check when I’m in meetings. If Dexcom wanted to also send a signal to an insulin pump that would be fine but I still would want a receiver. I wish the receiver was smaller and the graph y-axis was scaled to the data (rather than a fixed 25 to 400 scale) so it would be much easier to see trends. Other than that, I’ve had my Dexcom for almost 1 year and I’ve been very happy with it.
My wish is to have the option to purchase a mini-receiver just big enough to display a reading and trend arrows in addition to the regular sized receiver. The current receiver is well-implemented with a pleasing to handle shape but seems larger than it needs to be.
I have had my dexcom for 1 1/2 weeks-no complaints yet. so is everyone getting more than 1 week out of a sensor? I changed mine at 7 days but would like to get more out of the sensor. If you wear it longer does anyone have a problem with infections or irritation? I do wish you could zoom in or at least scroll over readings to tell what exactly the number was instead of having to upload onto a computer. All in all I love it
I use a sensor for two weeks pretty much every time I wear a new one. Once I even got almost three weeks out of a lucky one.
You’ll need to gain a little more experience before you can be completely confident about wearing a sensor for longer times, I find that the best accuracy comes at the very beginnning of week 2 for example. But later in week 2 I start to see bigger swings and often times the dreaded ??? start to appear. This does not necessarily mean that the sensor has gone bad, but its accuracy is surely declining.
Since I am paying the sensors out of my pocket, you can appreciate how important this is for me.
Ciao, Luca
I’m getting 2 weeks with almost every sensor. I guess that’s good enough for now.
Bigger numbers/better graphics. When the alert goes off in the middle of the night I cannot read the numbers or trend arrow without glasses.
When I said Dexcom shouldn’t be in the receiver business I meant that I would really like to see better software. Dexcom could partner with virtually any of the iphone/pda application developers who have Diabetes applications, which should be easy. Islet is pretty good (thanks). The Dexcom program is so 1980s…And if it were possible to have an iphone/pda function as the receiver, it would mean fewer things in my pockets, and fewer devices to recharge, which would be nice as well.
Larger memory in the receiver so that more than a week can be stored.
On your point about having more memory in the receiver to store more than a week of data, I can tell you that I’ve downloaded at least two months worth of data from my receiver, so the one week limit does not really apply. They say that one should download the data weekly, but there is no pressing need to do it weekly, in my experience.
Ciao, Luca
Better software for viewing data that is either compatible with Mac or is web-based.
That’s all. I’m easy.
Can’t wait for integration with the OmniPod to be a reality. My sources tell me 2010. The Dexcom receiver and the OmniPod PDM are roughly the same size so I can’t imagine why I’d want to carry both. Also the ability of the Freestyle meter in the PDM to calibrate the Dexcom in the PDM will be great. Andy
Ya I cant wait fore the new omnipod and the integration with the Dexcom. All youll have to carry around then is the Omnipod control and some test strips. I would like to see an iPhone app for the Dexcom too, so your iPhone can act as your receiver for your readings. I heard Dexcom was woking on a watch receiver so you could wear it while working out and it you wouldnt have to carry something everywhere you go. Any one else hear about this?
Also has any one else heard of the Glucoband? Its a non invasive blood sugar monitor that gives you readings displayed on a watch. It says its going to come out sometime in 2011 but im not sure.
http://www.medgadget.com/archives/2006/05/glucoband_proto_1.html
http://www.calistomedical.com/?cat=14
Hi - Yeah, I think the 3rd party receiver would be awesome but with both the FDA and insurance companies (coverage for a med device+personal in one) is probably not going to happen. I agree with the need for better alerts - I would like to be able to set my hi alert to 150 instead of 160 (intervals of at least 10 or 5 instead of the whopping 20).
Another wish list item is a standard USB charger instead of the existing charger (which I guess they’ve done to make a few extra bucks, but I would think they could just market the convenience of using a standard USB port to recharge it like cell phones have already done - I’ve only had the dexcom a few months and have already forgotten my charger over a weekend trip when it’s died/annoying!).
I very much second the USB port suggestion, for both the battery charging and the PC cable hookup.
I am not sure if other pins on the big connector are used for other reasons, but surely for us users it would be much simpler to have a mini USB port, something very common on most small devices nowadays.
Happy 2010 everyone!
Ciao, Luca