"Wireless Control of Blood Glucose in the Hospital"

Issue date: 06.08.08

Roche Diagnostics Rotkreuz, Switzerland’s office, announced the launch of the first wireless hospital blood glucose meter1. The launch was in the EMEA region (Europe, Middle East, South Africa), Asian and Latin American markets. The Accu-Chek Inform II system, which sends blood glucose results, patient and operator information to the hospital’s HIS or LIS through a data manager, is the successor to the #1 selling Accu-Chek Inform meter2.

For point of care co-ordinators, nurses and ICU personnel the task of keeping control of their patients’ blood glucose level becomes more challenging due to the raising number of glucose tests performed in hospitals. One reason is due to the increasing epidemic of diabetes. The World Health Organisation (WHO) expects an increase of the global prevalence of diabetes by 110 % over the next decades, which means that 366 million people will suffer from Diabetes in 2030. Secondly, the implementation of TGC (tight glycemic control) protocols raises the number of measurements and complexity of data processing. Due to the savings in workflow and better patient safety, wireless patient monitoring in the healthcare industry is expected to grow at a steady rate in the future. According to surveys in the United States more than 90 percent of medium sized and large hospitals either currently use wireless technology or have plans to adopt wireless technology in the future.3

While regulatory pressure from healthcare authorities is demanding that blood glucose testing is properly documented and monitored through quality control checks, the Accu-Chek Inform II system ensures that the right test is done on the right patient at the right time. Using the cobas IT 1000 data manager system, the real time verification of the patients’ identity at the bedside reflects the strong need for error prevention in point of care testing."Integrating point of care devices and the hospital IT network is a designated goal of Roche", said Dirk Ehlers, Head of Roche Professional Diagnostics. "Transferring the blood glucose information into the medical record quickly saves time for patient care and reduces costs."

Roche