fund continuous glucose monitors for people with type 1 diabetes<\/a>.<\/p>\nHe cried when he found out.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was just relieved that I could now live and not have that happen to me because that\u2019s traumatic … \u201d<\/p>\n
The monitor beeps and wakes him up if his blood sugar levels drop, and automatically gives him insulin.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s lifesaving and it\u2019s life changing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Monitors saving health system $53,000 daily <\/p>\n
A New Zealand Medical and Scientific Diabetes statement said more than 19,000 New Zealanders with type 1 diabetes had accessed monitors since they were funded.<\/p>\n
Modelling data showed it potentially cut healthcare costs by more than $53,000 a day.<\/p>\n
Their lifetime use was projected to avoid thousands of diabetes-related cases of kidney disease, ulcers, amputations, eye and cardiovascular complications, and almost 50,000 severe hypoglycaemia events.<\/p>\n
Endocrinologist and University of Otago associate professor Dr Rosemary Hall said glucose built up in the small blood vessels in the eyes, kidneys, heart and feet over time, increasing the risk of serious complications.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s that ongoing burden that makes tight glucose control so critical.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hall said advancements in diabetes management meant parents were comfortable letting their children do things they were once terrified to allow, including school camps and sleepovers.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s a huge change from the chronic sleep deprivation they\u2019ve previously lived with, waking up every night to check blood sugar levels.\u201d<\/p>\n
Diabetes NZ chief executive Heather Verry said the organisation had long advocated for continuous glucose monitors to be funded and was now advocating for all diabetics dependent on insulin to have access.<\/p>\n
Verry said type 1 diabetes was an autoimmune disease, type 2 was influenced by lifestyle and culture, and gestational diabetes was when pregnant mothers developed diabetes, but no longer had it after giving birth.<\/p>\n
\u201cYouth type 2 diabetes\u201d was \u201cemerging\u201d, where children as young as 8 were getting it, she said.<\/p>\n
Verry said more people were getting type 2 diabetes because of different cultures, less-mobile and busier lifestyles, and more access to processed food and takeaways.<\/p>\n
Pharmac device and assessment director David Hughes said the agency understood there was \u201csignificant interest\u201d in funding continuous glucose monitors for type 2 diabetes.<\/p>\n
It was progressing two applications \u2013 one for those who required \u201cintensive insulin\u201d with a \u201csuboptimal glycaemic profile\u201d and one for \u201cyouth onset\u201d.<\/p>\n
Pharmac would seek advice next year. Expert advisers would assess the device\u2019s effectiveness compared with funded options and consider its impact on people and the health system.<\/p>\n
Hughes could not say if or when a decision would be made. It depended on available budget, negotiations with suppliers, clinical advice and how they were prioritised compared with other treatments it would like to fund.<\/p>\n
Pharmac\u2019s decision to fund continuous glucose monitors for type 1 diabetes followed a funding application, which was assessed and ranked using its Factors for Consideration.<\/p>\n
Megan Wilson<\/a> is a health and general news reporter for the Bay of Plenty Times and the Rotorua Daily Post. She has been a journalist since 2021.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cI had such a violent seizure that it snapped four [vertebrae] of my spine. \u201cI bit through my…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":169830,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[110047,6030,33241,110046,38501,110045,8696,3535,65559,2837,2209,1888,71,59567,134,1345,671,424,35090,5158,25306,111,139,69,49160,20488,312,26257,3243,23747,15412,16800,1227,165,107,76351,7188,5977,6123,1842,1533],"class_list":["post-169829","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-38yearold","tag-again","tag-asleep","tag-boyd","tag-breaks","tag-connah","tag-device","tag-diabetes","tag-diabetic","tag-during","tag-father","tag-first","tag-from","tag-happening","tag-health","tag-home","tag-incident","tag-life","tag-lifechanging","tag-man","tag-monitoring","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-prevent","tag-reached","tag-says","tag-seizure","tag-snapped","tag-spine","tag-spot","tag-sweet","tag-tauranga","tag-their","tag-then","tag-traumatic","tag-uses","tag-which","tag-while","tag-wife","tag-will"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169829","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=169829"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169829\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/169830"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169829"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169829"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=169829"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}