Cell phones to measure blood sugar levels?

Three groups including Georgetown University teamed up Wednesday to develop a new way to measure the glucose levels of diabetes patients without a finger prick to draw their blood.

The technique involves the use of disposable skin patches (embedded with a wireless sensor chip) that can monitor glucose levels, and then transmit that information to a cell phone. With the data, the mobile phone could conceivably control an insulin pump remotely, according to the researchers.

The organizations involved in the project are Georgetown, Gentag, and Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), a technology development company. Also a tech research firm, Gentag has developed an RFID-sensor reader platform for cell phones. And with funding from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, researchers from Georgetown and SAIC created the skin patch technology, initially to monitor soldiers on the battlefield.

As part of their agreement, the groups will combine their respective intellectual property to develop the new application for diabetes patients. The patches will be able to monitor patients' blood every hour for a 24-hour period, and transmit that data to a device that's already familiar to many diabetes patients. The phones also include geolocation technology in the case of an emergency.

"We expect that this new, painless, disposable, wireless glucose sensor technology will significantly improve diabetes monitoring worldwide," Gentag President John Peeters said in a statement.

The organizations did not set a specific launch time for the technology.

[jamalystic]

Well this is a welcome development. I recently read an article on this but thought it's some kind of Web 2.0 science fiction stuff: Armed With Mobile Capabilities ( http://www.internetevolution.com/author.asp?section_id=466&doc_id=149261&F_src=flftwo)

[someguy999]

While I don't have diabetes its about time people are starting to look at every day things like cell phones and how to make them help mankind overall, hopefully this will inspire other illnesses in a similar fashion to look at how they can do something similar especially since even children are starting to get cellphones. While watching tv and doing other things on a cell phone is cool and all... saving lives and ensuring the best quality of life is way cooler!

Thanks for making this a headline!

[anythingbutmicrosoft]

The only thing that troubles me here is if they look to Microsoft infected phones to integrate with. Would you really want an unstable, insecure OS controlling your diabetes pump? I sure wouldn't trust an MS phone with mine. Fortunately I don't see any direct link to a pump happening anytime soon, even with reliable non-MS devices. There are too many other factors a glucose monitor can not take in to account such as past, current or anticipated activity levels that greatly affect dosage. But the continuous monitoring is helpful to any diabetic, especially if it can send alerts with GPS coordinates when a diabetic's glucose levels drop too low.