[Diabetes-talk] Dex com and T simple

Thu Oct 2 22:07:50 UTC 2014

Sandy and all, I attended one of the Taking Control of your Diabetes
seminars in March of 2013. I suspect we probably spoke to some of the same
people, especially the doctors. James, oh umm, forgot his last name, the guy
who came up with the talking remote for Medtronic pumps was also there. In
the exhibit hall I spent a lot of time with several of the pump companies,
though Animas wasn't there. And yes, the Animas screens are easy to read.
I've even done it with the KNFB reader, although it's not really a practical
way to function.
With me, the Tandem folks were great. I played extensively with the T-slim
pump to see if templates could be made to match the icons on the touch
screen. Unfortunately, no two screens were alike so it wouldn't be practical
to make an overlay. But they were willing to let me try the pump for a
month. The Omnipod folks were great as well. Oh nobody was going for speech,
but the individuals I met were very interested and it was fairly easy to get
into fine details since I'd been such a long-time pump user. 
As for CGM, well, I actually do have a Dexcom. Trouble is, accessibility
aside, as many questions as I asked, nobody bothered to mention that you
can't take Tylenol when you're using it unless you shut it off for about six
hours. So, mine's in the box. <grin> And they really don't get you out of
any finger sticks either because you have to regularly calibrate them
against, guess what? A finger stick! 
But it's good that the people running this excellent conference hear from
one of us everywhere they go. Maybe they'll know someone who knows someone,
and so on and so forth. I think the thing that impressed me th most was the
incredible amount of respect shown to those with Type Two. It was just oh so
refreshing.
Thanks for your report.
Veronica

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-----Original Message-----
From: Diabetes-talk [mailto:diabetes-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of
Sandra Ryan via Diabetes-talk
Sent: Wednesday, October 01, 2014 7:46 PM
To: 'Mike Freeman'; 'Diabetes Talk for the Blind'
Subject: Re: [Diabetes-talk] Dex com and T simple

Last weekend, I attended the Taking Control of Your Diabetes seminar in Des
Moines, Iowa.  It's a good program--practical, they admit no one's perfect,
and there's lots of good education and exhibits.  I spoke in a session about
continuous glucose monitoring about our inaccessibility issue.  The session
presenters were a young doc from California who has diabetes, and the editor
of Diabetes Forecast, who lives here and also has diabetes.  Before I spoke,
a lady had mentioned that Medicare won't pay for CGM.  The doctor told us
that, of the technologies currently available, all are great, but CGM is the
most useful, because it gets at one of people's most common complaints:
having to poke themselves for glucose readings.  

I said that diabetics who are blind or visually impaired have a different
problem: None of the CGM's or insulin pumps are accessible.  Both presenters
said they are aware of this, and that they believe these technologies must
be made accessible.  I was told both in this session and the one on insulin
pumps that the research demonstrating improved quality and quantity of life
using technologies has been done and is readily available, and both
presenters agreed it is a problem for blind people that they can't have the
best treatments because of inaccessibility.  

I also spoke with a representative of Tandem and one from Johnson & Johnson,
who makes the Animus pump.  The Animus rep understood why we need
accessibility and encouraged me to work toward getting it.  The Tandem rep
clicked his pen about a thousand times and told me that negotiations to get
accessible pumps and CGM's "will never be friendly."  

In one of the education sessions, I learned that the Medtronic screens are
very hard for anyone to read, that the Animus is much more readable, but
still difficult.  I have a handout, but from memory I think it was the
Omnipod that was most readable, but it had a different problem.  Definitely
none is perfect.

So it was an interesting way to spend a Saturday.

Sandi

-----Original Message-----
From: Diabetes-talk [mailto:diabetes-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of
Mike Freeman via Diabetes-talk
Sent: Wednesday, October 1, 2014 4:06 PM
To: 'Tamera'; 'Diabetes Talk for the Blind'
Subject: Re: [Diabetes-talk] Dex com and T simple

Way to go, tamera. Hopefully, those people came away at least slightly
enlightened.

Mike

-----Original Message-----
From: Diabetes-talk [mailto:diabetes-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of
Tamera via Diabetes-talk
Sent: Wednesday, October 01, 2014 12:43 PM
To: diabetes-talk at nfbnet.org
Subject: [Diabetes-talk] Dex com and T simple

I walked in the local JDRF walk this past Sunday and spoke with a person
from Tandem who makes the T simple pump, and she also uses a DEX com
herself, and wondered  if anyone is using either or finding any usable
accessibility with these. 

They sound terrific, but  meaningless with the lack of user accessibility.

Tamera

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