The New Nation - Internet Edition

Staff Reporter

Medtronic for the first time in the country launched 'Integrated Insulin Therapy,' a therapy system with insulin pump and continuous glucose monitoring system for the patients who use insulin to treat diabetes.

It is the first therapy to combine an insulin pump with continuous glucose readings and trend graphs, allowing patients to make immediate self-management decisions to improve their glucose control after confirming readings with a finger stick measurement.

The MiniMed Paradigm Real-Time System, the therapy system, will take immediate corrective or preventive action to help patients' healthy glucose levels in order to delay or prevent diabetes-related complications, including coma, blindness, kidney failure, amputation, impotence and heart disease.

This was disclosed at a press conference organised by Sonargaon Healthcare Pvt Ltd, a sole agent of Medtronic, at a city hotel yesterday.

Dr Prof AK Azad Khan, President of Bangladesh Diabetic Association, presided over the conference, while Dr Sudip Chatterjee, Consultant Endocrinologist of Park Children Centre for Treatment and Research in Kolkata, Prof Hazera Mahtab, Chairman of Board of Management of BIRDEM, Paul Chatterjee, Business Development Manager of Meditronic, among others, were present on the occasion.

Dr AK Azad said, "The therapy system integrates an external insulin pump with continuous glucose monitoring. The system's glucose sensor takes as many as 288 daily glucose readings per day - providing nearly 100 times more information than three daily finger stick readings provide."

Dr Sudip said, "In order to manage diabetes properly, patients must continually understand what affects their glucose patterns and take action to regain as quickly as possible."

The system is calibrated twice a day (every 12 hours) by entering a blood glucose measurement from a standard metre into the insulin pump. The price range of this therapy system will be available in the market from Tk 1,28,000 to Tk five lakh varies with different models.