S19 E26 - How to take the guesswork out of Managing Diabetes

Diabetes is an Epidemic in the US with 1.6 Million Adults & 283,000 Child Diabetics. A study out that says that's going to increase by 65% over the next four decades. So think about that. If you're already at 1.6 million and you're going to increase that by 65%, now you're doubling it, okay, to 3,000,003 and a half million.

In this episode, our expert guests are from Medtronic: 

Ron Hoyler is a diabetes nurse. He's an educator and he's a nurse clinician. He has a master's in business administration, health care administration, a master's of science in nursing, a bachelor of arts degree in personnel administration, associate applied Science in Nursing degree as well, and he is a certified diabetes technician, a certified diabetes care and education specialist, a certified insulin pump trainer, a 2022 Medtronic Core Training MVP, and he was patient experience champion for Children's Mercy Hospital.

Ed Clasby has been with Medtronic for 21 years, so he certainly knows his way around the medical equipment business. But the purpose of this show is to educate you about diabetes and the two products that can make a big difference in your life.

Ep 1926

Contact:

Medtronics Phone number 888-882-8602.

https://www.medtronicdiabetes.com/products/minimed-780g-insulin-pump-system

Episode 1926 Transcript:



00;00;01;14 - 00;00;05;17

Announcer

And now America's Healthcare Advocate, Cary Hall.

00;00;05;22 - 00;00;26;19

Cary Hall

Hello, America. Welcome to America's Healthcare Advocate show broadcasting coast to coast across the U.S. here on the HIA Radio Network. My producer in studio today, Mr. Shaun Floyd, the man behind the camera, Dave Thiessen. We are doing our broadcast here at the Audacy Studios today. If you want to find out more about us, you can go to the website America's Healthcare Advocate dot com.

00;00;26;19 - 00;00;48;18

Cary Hall

All of the shows are posted up there and there are 14 count them 14 podcast platforms. Yes, I'm going to make you listen while I read them. And we are also on YouTube. The YouTube numbers are at 257,000 views. Downloads of people that are paying attention to this radio show and podcast because we are on American stations all over the country.

00;00;48;21 - 00;01;16;18

Cary Hall

But we're also podcast and YouTube. Now, thanks to Mr. Thiessen and all of his magic, the podcast platforms are Spotify, SoundCloud, RSS podcast, Overcast, Rumble, Apple Podcasts, Pocket Podcast, Pandora, TuneIn, Stitcher, Spreaker, Amazon, Google Podcasts, Audacy and YouTube. So you can find us up there and you know, tell you a story. We had the founder of a company called Neuro 20 who did a radio show with us.

00;01;16;19 - 00;01;37;27

Cary Hall

JD came in and did this show with us and he went on a trip and he was in Turkey to talk about the Neuro 20 electro muscular stimulation suit. And he walked into the office of this very large medical practice in Turkey. And up on the computer screen was the podcast America's Healthcare Advocate. And they said to him, Is that you?

00;01;38;04 - 00;02;02;17

Cary Hall

JD said, JD Schmidt said, Yes, that is me. So I know you're listening in Turkey, we thank you very much. And I have no idea wherever everybody else is listening. But we're very happy that you are paying attention this podcast and listening to it. So we really appreciate the listenership and the support we get both on the radio and on the podcast and YouTube, which is kind of new for us because we've been doing it about a year.

00;02;02;19 - 00;02;25;27

Cary Hall

So this show today is one that I've wanted to do for some time. You know, we're going to talk about diabetes today. Then why am I doing that? Because there is an epidemic of diabetes in this country. You have 1.6 million people in this country, adults that have diabetes, and that number is going up every day. And here's a real tragedy.

00;02;25;29 - 00;02;48;19

Cary Hall

283,000 children in this country are diabetics. And there's a there's a study out that says that's going to increase by 65% over the next four decades. So think about that. If you're already at 1.6 million and you're going to increase that by 65%, now you're doubling it, okay, to 3.5 million. Look at where you're at.

00;02;48;22 - 00;03;00;28

Cary Hall

Okay, we've got a problem. Okay. And what you know, I do shows like the one we're going to do today when I have experts in studio joining me is Ron Hoyler for Medtronic. Thank you for being here in studio with me.

00;03;01;04 - 00;03;02;06

Ron Hoyler

Thanks, Cary, for having me.

00;03;02;07 - 00;03;08;06

Cary Hall

Glad to have here and Ed Clasby, who is joining us visa vie Zoom today and where are you at?

00;03;08;08 - 00;03;10;26

Ed Clasby

I am down in our corporate office in San Antonio. Oh, you're.

00;03;10;26 - 00;03;29;05

Cary Hall

In San Antonio, Texas. So it's probably a little warmer down here than it is up here. But anyway, they're both joining us today. Ed has been with Medtronic for 21 years, so he certainly knows his way around the medical equipment business what this is all about. But the purpose of this show is to talk to you and educate you about diabetes.

00;03;29;08 - 00;03;58;06

Cary Hall

There are two products that we're going to talk about today for Medtronic that can make a big difference in your life. If you're a parent with a child that has has this disease, you know how difficult this is to keep this under control and do what needs to be done. And if you are if you're you know, if you're in the sandwich generation and that's your mom or your dad, you know, my wife's father was a type one diabetic and he constantly battled the insulin battle where he would have issues have to, you know, eat some fruit, drink, drink some water.

00;03;58;06 - 00;04;18;00

Cary Hall

She'd do something to get the insulin level back up where it needed to be because his pancreas wasn't doing what it was supposed to do. But we're going to talk about solutions that I think it's really important. So a little bit about Ron Hoyler of Ron is a practicing nurse. He was before he was at Medtronic.

00;04;18;02 - 00;04;42;10

Cary Hall

He was at Children's Mercy Hospital. So he is a diabetes nurse. He's an educator and he's a nurse clinician. We're very happy that he was able to come in today and do this show because there's a lot here to talk about. He has a master's in Business administration, health care administration, a master's of science in nursing, a Bachelor of Arts degree in personnel administration, associate applied Science in Nursing degree as well.

00;04;42;17 - 00;05;00;07

Cary Hall

And he is a certified diabetes technician, a certified diabetes care and education specialist, a certified pump trainer, 2022 Medtronic Core Training MVP, and he was patient experience champion for Children's Mercy Hospital. How many years were you a children's mercy?

00;05;00;11 - 00;05;01;06

Ron Hoyler

20 years.

00;05;01;06 - 00;05;19;25

Cary Hall

Care. Okay, so he's 20 years and he's so the child portion of this today is a real important portion. And he's going to be able to talk to that very directly. You know, Ed has been with, as I said, Medtronic for 21 years. One of the things about Medtronic that I had the I happened to own this stock and about doing the show because I own the stock, it is nothing to do with that.

00;05;19;28 - 00;05;39;13

Cary Hall

But I followed this company for a long time and they are really on the cutting edge of a lot of technology that directly affects different diseases and different issues that people have. And this these two pieces that we're going to talk about in the broadcast today are two of those things. One is a pin, which is a diabetes Medtronic pin.

00;05;39;13 - 00;05;56;11

Cary Hall

The other one is an insulin pump very different from anything else in the marketplace. So I think you'll find this interesting. But let's not let's not even go to that yet. Ron. Let's talk about 1.6 million people and two in 83,000 kids. And this ain't getting any better, right?

00;05;56;11 - 00;06;15;20

Ron Hoyler

In fact, those numbers may be outdated already. It's just increasing at such a rate that it's hard to keep track of it. What we do know is that we're constantly seeing new people diagnosed with diabetes. And we also have the expectation that there's quite a few people out there that have pre-diabetes and don't even know it.

00;06;15;23 - 00;06;27;25

Cary Hall

Yeah, and the prediabetes and type two diabetes is a big deal because that's the gateway If you're not paying attention and you don't know about that, you're candidate to go to type one and then life changes dramatically.

00;06;27;25 - 00;06;52;14

Ron Hoyler

Yes, well, actually type two does not change into type one. There are two distinct different types of diabetes. The most prevalent of all diabetes is type two, with about 90% of all people with the type of diabetes having type two with type one diabetes, that's closer to about 10% of the population. And with type one, your pancreas is no longer able to make the hormone insulin.

00;06;52;17 - 00;06;56;02

Ron Hoyler

So it must be replaced for you to be able to survive.

00;06;56;09 - 00;07;03;27

Cary Hall

And that's why people have to do the insulin injections that you have been they've been doing these for. I don't know. How long has this been going on?

00;07;03;29 - 00;07;06;25

Ron Hoyler

We just had a 100 year anniversary in 2021.

00;07;06;25 - 00;07;11;02

Cary Hall

You would know that 100 year anniversary. This is how long this is going.

00;07;11;03 - 00;07;11;17

Ron Hoyler

Yeah.

00;07;11;24 - 00;07;16;28

Cary Hall

Would it be fair to say that we have an epidemic of diabetes in this country?

00;07;17;01 - 00;07;33;11

Ron Hoyler

We have a pandemic in this world. It's the most common chronic disorder, along with heart disease and high blood pressure In the United States, one out of every $4 spent on health care is for diabetes related situation.

00;07;33;13 - 00;07;52;15

Cary Hall

It is that. What is that what drove Medtronic to spend the time the effort. God only knows the research dollars that were spent to develop these two products that we're seeing on the screen behind you. Is that what drove Medtronic to step into this space and put together these two tools that we'll talk about later in the broadcast?

00;07;52;17 - 00;08;12;16

Ed Clasby

But absolutely, Medtronic's a clinically driven company and an engineering company at heart, and that was our main focus, is to alleviate pain, extend lives, you know, really give the patients an opportunity to live their best lives without the burdensome highs and lows of diabetes.

00;08;12;19 - 00;08;36;14

Cary Hall

So Ron, Ed just said that we're going to get we're coming out of the break here in a couple of minutes. But the highs and lows, I talked about off here back in the day when I was a very young man, I was a police officer. And I remember in the training at two different police academies, we were taught that if you pulled somebody over and you thought they were drunk, that they smelled sweet or had a sweet smelling breath, that there was a possibility they were diabetic.

00;08;36;14 - 00;08;44;14

Cary Hall

And you have to ask them, are they going into insulin shock or having an insulin low blood sugar event? Is that what we're talking about when we say highs and lows?

00;08;44;16 - 00;09;03;29

Ron Hoyler

Yeah, when your blood sugars are extremely high or extremely low, they go they're going to disorient you in your process of thinking. If you're behind the wheel of a car, you may begin to swerve. You may actually look like a drunk driver and a police officer could pull you over, you could be combative, you could have slurred speech.

00;09;04;04 - 00;09;06;03

Ron Hoyler

He, of course, will probably think you're.

00;09;06;04 - 00;09;11;27

Cary Hall

All things that you would think somebody, if you're the police officer. Okay. Was drunk.

00;09;11;28 - 00;09;12;13

Ron Hoyler

Correct.

00;09;12;17 - 00;09;13;26

Cary Hall

Or on drugs.

00;09;13;26 - 00;09;14;19

Ron Hoyler

Sure.

00;09;14;21 - 00;09;36;17

Cary Hall

Okay. So that that is an actual issue when we talk about the highs and lows, I remember Laurie's father, we would be out someplace or at a function or doing something. And if he started to have a blood sugar problem, I immediately had to get him something like orange juice or something. It had a content in it that would bring down the level.

00;09;36;19 - 00;09;52;03

Cary Hall

Bring up the levels. Yeah. Yeah. So, all right, when we come back from a break, we're going to get further into the topic, but I just want to set the stage here so you can understand what we're talking about today and how the show is going to run in terms of going through these issues. So stay tuned. We'll be right back after the break.

00;09;52;06 - 00;10;05;08

Cary Hall

You're listening to America's Healthcare Advocate. Broadcasting here on the HIA Radio Network, coast to coast across the USA. Stay tuned. The experts are in the House today talking about diabetes. We'll be right back after the break.

00;10;05;10 - 00;10;38;16

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00;10;38;18 - 00;11;04;23

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00;11;04;25 - 00;11;24;23

Cary Hall

Welcome back you're listening to America's Healthcare Advocates broadcasting coast to coast across the USA here on the HIA Radio Network. My producer in studio, Mr. Sean Floyd, the man behind the camera, Dave Thiessen. Welcome. Glad to have you back. I'm your host, Cary Holding studio with me, Ron Hoyler He is an RN and a diabetes expert joining us.

00;11;24;23 - 00;11;49;05

Cary Hall

These are via zoom out of San Antonio, Texas, Ed Clasby who has been with the Medtronic folks for 21 years. We are talking about diabetes, the epidemic, or as Ron described it, pandemic of diabetes in this country, 1.6 million people with diabetes, 283,000 children, and the number is going up every day, 65% increase anticipated over the next 40 years.

00;11;49;05 - 00;12;14;26

Cary Hall

That is not a good situation. So what we're talking about is how if you are a type one diabetes, you can live your life. And we're going to talk about that in the segment. We're going to talk about how you can live a normal life if you can keep this disease under control and manage it. So let's just go to you know, the first thing that jumps out at me is seniors, because seniors are at a higher risk rate for diabetes than I think.

00;12;14;26 - 00;12;18;03

Cary Hall

If I'm correct, then any other class, Is that correct?

00;12;18;06 - 00;12;39;15

Ron Hoyler

Well, you know, there's a lot of different classes, depending on your socioeconomic status, on your type of background, even financial and weight and other factors. So it's hard to differentiate that to just one class. Everybody really is at risk for it and that's why it's so prevalent.

00;12;39;18 - 00;13;04;22

Cary Hall

So let's let but let's let's talk about seniors, because that's an issue. And I mentioned in the opening segment where you've got you have people that have got parents that are in their eighties, nineties and older than that. These days people are living to be 100. It's not all that unusual anymore. And they have diabetes and maybe the child, you know, who's trying to be a caregiver, trying to manage them is in another city.

00;13;04;24 - 00;13;25;17

Cary Hall

Or maybe that they're here, you know, in Kansas City or in Phoenix, wherever you're listening to this broadcast at, you know, in Nashville, Tennessee. But you can't be there every day to make sure mom or dad or grandma and grandpa or your aunt or your uncle, who is it we're talking about here is doing what they need do to make sure they're managing diabetes and getting proper insulin.

00;13;25;23 - 00;13;42;20

Cary Hall

Talking about what people go through that I've heard stories where, you know, in case of insulin, the cost of insulin, when people are injecting insulin that they stored in the refrigerator and they hoard it, they don't want to take to it because of the cost and because of other issues. Talk a little bit about that. Run your experience with that.

00;13;42;20 - 00;14;01;03

Ron Hoyler

Well, you're so right on all of those levels. Cary, for instance, diabetes is something that you live with. And when I say live with, I mean it's with you. When you're sleeping, it's with you. Every time you open your mouth to eat something, it's something you constantly have to be aware of. You have to be aware of what your blood sugar levels doing.

00;14;01;03 - 00;14;09;05

Ron Hoyler

You have to be aware of calculating the dose of insulin you have to take. That involves math. Right. And, you know, I like to say math is a four letter word.

00;14;09;07 - 00;14;11;29

Cary Hall

But it is to me, I'll tell you that.

00;14;12;02 - 00;14;26;03

Ron Hoyler

Because a lot of people don't like it and maybe aren't doing well at it. But additionally, it's also a medication you have to be responsible about taking. It is truly such a burden, as you mentioned. But it's difficult. It is it is hard to.

00;14;26;03 - 00;14;53;03

Cary Hall

No talk about that. I mean, we talk about these highs and lows. Yeah, it's difficult. I go back to my you know, my wife's father when he was alive, the issue he had with maintaining that it's very hard for him to know, especially if they're chronologically challenged. Okay. One of those seasoned citizens you're looking at me, obviously, you know, to be able to manage this and make sure, hey, did I you know, did I remember to take it today?

00;14;53;07 - 00;14;56;22

Cary Hall

Remember to take the right amount where I'm not feeling good. What should I do? Right.

00;14;56;22 - 00;15;11;08

Ron Hoyler

And you know, another good point. I'm not feeling good. Is that because of my blood sugar? Well, I have to look at my blood sugar and else my blood sugar, high or low. Well, because my blood sugar can be high if I've eaten too many carbohydrates, it can be low because I took too much insulin to try to offset that.

00;15;11;14 - 00;15;21;07

Ron Hoyler

It's a constant balancing act. Again, the burden is always there and it's so terrific and it causes burnout and it causes people to want to give up.

00;15;21;10 - 00;15;23;24

Cary Hall

And that's that's that's scary.

00;15;23;25 - 00;15;29;13

Ron Hoyler

Right? And then the other scary thing is, like you've mentioned, if it's your parents, but it could be your children, too.

00;15;29;14 - 00;15;49;13

Cary Hall

Let's do that because you're this you know, you worked at Children's Nursery for 20 years and you're an expert in child diabetes. And that's a real tragedy. I, I have a friend who worked at Blue Cross and Blue Shield who lost his son to type one diabetes. This was probably about a year ago. You know, they battled and battled and battled and he finally passed away.

00;15;49;16 - 00;15;55;18

Cary Hall

They so talk about this issue. You got to it, 83,000 kids with this. Talk about the issue with children.

00;15;55;18 - 00;16;11;21

Ron Hoyler

Right. And kids, they aren't necessarily able to do the math yet. They aren't aware that I can't have more or less of this food. They just want to eat because they're hungry. They want to be able to be with their friends and go out to get pizza. They want to be at school where the parents aren't and they have a school lunch or they have snacks.

00;16;11;23 - 00;16;32;16

Ron Hoyler

So much of diabetes revolves around the fact that it is affecting food that you eat. It's affecting activity using a lot of exercise or recess that burns the glucose and may cause you to go low. It's just every aspect of your life. And if it's your child, I have parents that don't want to let that child leave the house.

00;16;32;16 - 00;16;43;14

Ron Hoyler

They have the child sleep with them. They're scared to death of diabetes and what it might do to their child. And there needs to be a better way to manage it. And there is a better way now. But it's been a long time coming.

00;16;43;18 - 00;17;00;05

Cary Hall

We're going to talk about that now. Let's go to the last group that I want to talk to here. That's just adults and the fact that adults face all these issues. But I want to kind of segue from that before we go to break that there are people living very normal lives who are NFL football players, baseball players, even medicine, Olympic athletes.

00;17;00;13 - 00;17;01;28

Cary Hall

So let's talk about that for a minute.

00;17;02;00 - 00;17;22;08

Ron Hoyler

Yeah, and that's the great news about this. Diabetes is completely manageable. It takes work. It takes a lot of work. And what we're working towards doing is reducing that burden. But it is manageable. And that's the important point to remember, because so many people look at it as something that they're never going to be able to overcome or master.

00;17;22;14 - 00;17;26;21

Ron Hoyler

And that's the wrong perception of it. You can manage diabetes successfully.

00;17;26;24 - 00;17;51;19

Cary Hall

Yeah, and I'd have to say that if you're playing in the NFL, you could go out on a football field and get the living hell beat out of you for four quarters of football and it'd be a Type one diabetic. You can probably manage to handle it. You know, if you're if you're if you're a if you're a truck driver or you're or you're you're an insurance broker or, you know, or whatever the case may be, there's probably a pretty good chance you can handle the disease and live a relatively normal life.

00;17;51;19 - 00;17;53;09

Cary Hall

Would you agree with that.

00;17;53;11 - 00;17;59;17

Ed Clasby

100% care? We want to give the patients their opportunity to live their best lives with no restriction.

00;17;59;19 - 00;18;01;10

Cary Hall

And that's really what this is about, isn't it?

00;18;01;10 - 00;18;02;00

Ron Hoyler

Absolutely.

00;18;02;00 - 00;18;30;00

Cary Hall

Yeah. And that's about and, you know, in this in the next segment, we're going to talk about that because what we've basically done here, just so you all understand where this is going, is we have framed the problem now in these first two segments. What I wanted to do was I wanted to lay it out. Whether you're a child, whether you've got a parent or grandparent with this issue or a friend, whatever the case may be, or if if if it's you and you're just you know, you're an adult and you're trying to live a normal life, you run to work.

00;18;30;00 - 00;18;46;16

Cary Hall

Maybe you're the mom, you've got three kids, you know, like, you know, my daughter. My daughter and Washington's got four children. They're all of the age five. So, I mean, she's not a diabetic, but but obviously, those things are out there. And that's the whole purpose of doing this. Hey, so we come back from the break now. We frame the problem.

00;18;46;23 - 00;19;08;17

Cary Hall

Now I'm going to show you the solution. We're going to talk about two pieces of equipment that Medtronic has. One is the pump and one is the insulin pen. There's nothing and I mean, when I say this, there is nothing on the marketplace that compares to what they're offering now in terms of diabetes management, keeping you well and letting you function like you have a pancreas.

00;19;08;17 - 00;19;29;05

Cary Hall

It's really working. You're going to learn a lot. Okay. There's a lot more coming. We've got the experts here today. We've got a lot more to talk about. Stay tuned. We'll be right back after the break. You're listening to America's Healthcare Advocate broadcasting here on the HIA Radio Network. And by the way, the website, if you want to learn more Medtronic diabetes dot com, Medtronic diabetes, dot com.

00;19;29;05 - 00;19;46;26

Cary Hall

You're curious. Go out there and look or maybe you want to talk to somebody. Maybe it's your parent to find out if it works for them. Call 877 576 6641. Stay tuned. We'll be right back after the break. We've got more here on America's Healthcare Advocate.

00;19;46;28 - 00;19;52;17

Cary Hall

Welcome back. You're listening to America's Healthcare Advocates broadcasting coast to coast across the USA.

00;19;52;23 - 00;20;16;24

Cary Hall

My producer, Mr. Shawn Floyd, he's the man is handling all the audio here today. And my producer behind the camera, Dave Thiessen. I'm your host, Kari Hall, in studio with me actually in studio and in San Antonio, Texas, joining us via Zoom. Ron Hoyler is an hour in a man who worked at Children's Mercy Hospital for 20 years and understands this diabetes exceptionally well as he ministered took care of children that had the disease.

00;20;16;29 - 00;20;37;13

Cary Hall

And Ed Clasby who has been with the Medtronic folks for 21 years and understands the products that Medtronic has out there that are FDA approved and they are cutting edge products. And our focus today is diabetes. And the whole first two segments I just did, it was about we're going to frame the problem and the disease. Now you're going to hear the solution.

00;20;37;13 - 00;20;58;00

Cary Hall

And I think you're going to be surprised. If you want to learn more, go to the website Medtronic Diabetes dot com So it's your mom, your dad, maybe it's your child. Okay, that's got this. Go to the website. All their information is up there or call 877 576 6641 Maybe you want to ask somebody, is this appropriate for my dad?

00;20;58;03 - 00;21;17;07

Cary Hall

My mom, Is it appropriate for my 11 year old child? I don't know. But you can call and you can ask and they'll help you. Eight, seven, seven, five, seven, six 6641 Tell them you heard it here. All right. So let's just so Michael Milken did a piece in the Wall Street Journal. He's got a book out now.

00;21;17;09 - 00;21;38;20

Cary Hall

I did a show on this for a huge part of a show called The Coming Medical Revolution. It's what's going to happen, how the eight people, you know, aging is slowing down, Diseases are being cured, cancer is being cured. Let's frame that for diabetes. Where were we in 1980? Let's go from the Stone Age to what I'll call the Elon Musk type and rocket age.

00;21;38;20 - 00;21;39;19

Cary Hall

Okay.

00;21;39;21 - 00;21;48;18

Ron Hoyler

Well, look, you know, it was really right around 1980 that we first had the ability to poke a finger, get a drop of blood and read what a blood sugar was.

00;21;48;18 - 00;22;03;17

Cary Hall

So literally before 1980. So I'm 74 years old. So if you were 19, 20, 30, 40 years old in 1967, 1969, all the way up to 90, you had no way to measure this.

00;22;03;24 - 00;22;15;28

Ron Hoyler

Actually, there were a couple pretty unsophisticated ways of checking blood sugar. There was the dipstick for a urine.

00;22;16;01 - 00;22;17;10

Cary Hall

It was all, yeah.

00;22;17;12 - 00;22;23;10

Ron Hoyler

You could put that in. There'd be a chemical reaction if the blood sugar was high in the if it was high in the urine.

00;22;23;12 - 00;22;25;23

Cary Hall

But if you didn't have to go to the bathroom, how are you going.

00;22;25;28 - 00;22;36;12

Ron Hoyler

Yeah, well, there really wasn't a good way prior to that. It was even worse. You actually tasted your urine, and if it was sweet, you knew that your blood sugar levels were high and it spilled over into your urine.

00;22;36;12 - 00;22;51;15

Cary Hall

May sound disgusting, folks, but I'm trying to make a point here. This is where we're at. So now we're going to go from the Stone Age to the rocket age. So now. Right like so let's talk about where we are today. And I want you to we're going to first thing we're going to do right now is we're going to talk about this Medtronic pump that I want.

00;22;51;15 - 00;23;12;14

Cary Hall

I want you to understand this is called the MiniMed 780G system. You want to put that up so everybody can see it? Look at the size of this thing. This is like for those either remember what pagers were. Okay, this looks like a pager that used to wear, you know, when your boss would paged you, you had to run to a phone with a roll of quarters and call or dimes.

00;23;12;21 - 00;23;19;08

Cary Hall

Well, that's what this looks like. It's about that size. So it's very small. Talk about what this does. Let's just start there.

00;23;19;12 - 00;23;47;10

Ron Hoyler

Well, you know, what's great about this is instead of taking four or five or six injections a day with a needle and syringe or a pen, this pump is able to use a sophisticated algorithm. It will connect onto your body, basically by virtue of a Band-Aid, more or less. And it holds it in place to give insulin subcutaneously, and it will do it at programed rates that your provider is able to put in here.

00;23;47;13 - 00;24;11;12

Ron Hoyler

From that point, it begins to learn your body's need for insulin and the amount that you're taking to keep your blood sugars in check at a healthy level. And when we're talking about blood sugars at a healthy level, then we're looking at a reduction in those complications. We discussed at the beginning of the program and the vast amount of money and the vast amount of burden that was caused by diabetes.

00;24;11;15 - 00;24;20;26

Ron Hoyler

And so this is able to actually use technology to learn your body's insulin needs and keep it at a healthy level.

00;24;20;28 - 00;24;41;03

Cary Hall

You know, this must have taken a long time. I mean, there are other pumps on the marketplace. Okay. This must have taken a long time to develop in terms of the level of sophistication, the size of it and what it does. I've heard back, you know, back in the day when I was actively working as a broker, these pumps were very, very expensive.

00;24;41;03 - 00;24;50;20

Cary Hall

They were very cumbersome and people had a lot of trouble with them. This is significantly different. Talk a little bit about the process and how we got to this.

00;24;50;23 - 00;25;25;11

Ed Clasby

You know.

00;25;25;13 - 00;25;56;14

Cary Hall

So Ron and I sat through a couple of presentations. You guys had done one with Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas City. Some of the others I know I've I've learned a lot listening to you, but basically from a layman standpoint, what that says to me when I look at that device and what it can do is that that that is now my pancreas is really I mean, from a layman standpoint, but I don't have to think about, am I going to need do I need am I am I starting to have a problem?

00;25;56;20 - 00;25;59;19

Cary Hall

I don't have to think it's its thinking for me. Am I right?

00;25;59;22 - 00;26;23;11

Ron Hoyler

We're not quite there yet. That's what the goal is. We're working towards a closed loop system and as Ed mentioned, this is an advanced hybrid, closed loop system. There's still an amount of work or responsibility that you have, but it is helping take so much of that off your plate and allow you to, as we talked about, live your life like you want to.

00;26;23;11 - 00;26;37;25

Cary Hall

Okay, So you mentioned sleep. I bet you that, you know, if you're not diabetic, you probably have no idea that it affects your sleep. Talk about having this on because I heard you do this at the Blue Cross presentation. Talk about having your son at night and how it helps you sleep.

00;26;37;27 - 00;26;55;20

Ron Hoyler

Right? Well, you know, I think there's an inherent fear, fear that we don't want to go to sleep and not wake up. And that's something that people with diabetes often face. And when you have the sophistication of a system like this that will actually turn off the insulin, if your blood sugar is getting too low, give you a correction.

00;26;55;20 - 00;27;09;29

Ron Hoyler

If it's getting too high and it'll do it all without burdening you, making you wonder. I have patients that they have a spouse that loses sleep worrying about them, parents with baby cameras.

00;27;10;01 - 00;27;21;22

Cary Hall

A child. Oh, yeah. Didn't you tell me off here that there are patients that have children in that situation? That child sleeps in the bed with them. Be sure. You're sure does. Something's going to happen.

00;27;21;25 - 00;27;44;18

Ron Hoyler

You're absolutely right. There are families that do that. And you can understand because when you're talking about a low blood sugar, you may go into convulsions, you may go into shock. It's an emergent situation and no parent wants to see their child experience that. And it's an everyday possibility when you're dealing with type two diabetes, which is why this improvement in the way we're able to treat it is so important.

00;27;44;21 - 00;28;04;10

Cary Hall

So where is the data going, Ed, that this pump is collecting? Is it going back to the provider? And if you're the if you're the if you're the child who's managing your mother or your grandfather who's in a nursing home and a type one diabetic, can you can you can that information be sent back to you see, hey, Mom's doing well.

00;28;04;12 - 00;28;08;10

Cary Hall

The pump is keeping her where she needs to be. Can you talk about that a little bit?

00;28;08;13 - 00;28;56;09

Ed Clasby

absolutely Cary, and with the advancements and with the cloud and the Internet and everything, we’re fully Bluetooth enabled on insulin pumps. So the nice thing is that the patient who is wearing the pump can go ahead and connect up to five family members to receive the data that’s on the pump. The family members will also receive a text if the patient was to go high or low. So in your example, if it’s mom or dad and they live in another city, you as the child can get, you know, an adult child can get the text from mom and dad’s insulin pump right to their phone, right to the cloud, right to you that mom or dad are having an issue and you can call a neighbor or a support system in that town to really help mom and dad.

00;28;56;11 - 00;29;10;16

Cary Hall

So let's switch that scenario, Ron. And it's your child now, right? And your child's got to go to school, right? And your child wants to go eat pizza at lunch. Okay, It's simple. Yeah, about that. Well, how does that work If the child's got the pump now in different deal?

00;29;10;21 - 00;29;23;26

Ron Hoyler

Yeah, it should be simple. But with diabetes, it may not be. Unless you have the advantage of this technology, we don't know really. What. How much is that child going to eat when it comes to pizza? I know I can put away quite a few choices.

00;29;23;26 - 00;29;24;22

Cary Hall

I can do pretty well, right?

00;29;24;23 - 00;29;44;05

Ron Hoyler

Pizza. And that's always a hard thing to try to figure out with this system, a parent is not only going to be able to see the child's blood sugar, they'll see how much insulin that child gave for the amount of carbs or food they were eating. Additionally, if the school has a school nurse or a teacher, they want to have looked in as a caregiver.

00;29;44;12 - 00;29;54;13

Ron Hoyler

They'll be aware of that. And so you have multiple ways for different caregivers to be aware of what's going in your child's body and what it's doing to their blood sugar.

00;29;54;16 - 00;30;11;29

Cary Hall

Do you see now why I wanted to do this show? Do you understand the importance of what we're talking about here today? This is critically important. If you've got somebody in your family, your extended family, whatever the case may be that is dealing with this issue, maybe it's you. You're the one listing this and it's your problem. Maybe it's your wife, maybe it's your husband.

00;30;12;01 - 00;30;40;24

Cary Hall

Learn more. The website is Medtronic Diabetes dot com. Medtronic diabetes dot com. Phone number 877576 6640 1877576 6641. We come back we're going to talk about the pin. This is another revolutionary product they've got. If you don't want to do the pump, you can do this. I think you're going to find it very interesting. Stay tuned. You're listening to America's Healthcare Advocate broadcasting here on the HIA Radio Network.

00;30;40;27 - 00;31;04;27

Cary Hall

Coast to coast across the U.S. We've got more. Don't go anywhere. And welcome back. You're listening to America's Healthcare Advocates Show, broadcasting coast to coast across the fruited plain here on the radio network, my producer, Shawn Floyd and Dave Thiessen. I'm your host, Kari Hall. Look, you know, this is on every podcast platform. It's out there practically 15 podcast and YouTube platforms.

00;31;04;27 - 00;31;24;04

Cary Hall

This show is on. So you're hearing this now or you've caught some of this or you're in the car or whatever the case may be, and you've got somebody you want to talk to about this. Just have them go watch the podcast there. It's all right. They're on the podcast. You know, if they don't want to hear the first two segments, go to the third segment, say, Hey, just move it up.

00;31;24;04 - 00;31;42;19

Cary Hall

Go to the third segment and listen to these folks describe the pump. And now we're going to describe the pin. But you need to make them aware that there's an opportunity here. This could solve a myriad of problems for people with you're with your parents, your grandparents. Maybe it's you. You're an adult, maybe it's your wife. You have to go watch the show.

00;31;42;22 - 00;32;07;12

Cary Hall

Okay. Go to the podcast platforms. It's up there. Okay. And if your child. Same thing. All right. So the website Medtronic diabetes dot com Medtronic diabetes come the phone number if you want to call it you know is it appropriate for my child my my grandparent whatever the case may be 877576 6641 And yes, you can ask your doctor, do you have access to these pumps?

00;32;07;12 - 00;32;16;06

Cary Hall

Do you have access to this pin? Because if they don't, they should. Okay. So ask your doctor about it. All right. Now we're going to talk about fit. Can I borrow your pin?

00;32;16;08 - 00;32;18;00

Ron Hoyler

Sure can.

00;32;18;02 - 00;32;29;26

Cary Hall

That's the pin, folks. Do you see it? That's what he's talking about. Yeah. I don't think it could be any simpler than that. Okay, take that thing apart there for it's run, and let's just throw them of this is so. It's what it looks like.

00;32;29;28 - 00;32;31;07

Ron Hoyler

It looks like a magic marker.

00;32;31;07 - 00;32;50;12

Cary Hall

Yeah, right. This is no bigger than that. I mean, literally he had when he came in studio, I didn't realize that was the pin. Actual Medtronic pin. I thought it was a pin pin. Okay, look at this thing. That's that. That is about as small and sophisticated as you can get. So. So. So, Ed, talk about how this works.

00;32;50;12 - 00;32;56;18

Cary Hall

This is this is an amazing product. I've seen the presentations on this. Let's talk about how it works.

00;32;56;20 - 00;33;02;23

Ed Clasby

Yeah. So it's carried some preloaded syringe that you're able to dial up your dose.

00;33;02;26 - 00;33;09;25

Cary Hall

Cartridge in it. Is that you're sure? Okay. Here, we're going to show the cartridge. There it is right there. Drop it right there. Okay.

00;33;09;28 - 00;33;29;20

Ed Clasby

Yeah. And you can dial up your exact dose and give it to you so you can carry it with you all times. It's convenient. It's easy. You can take it out. As you had mentioned earlier, you can use do with a real pad. So patients that want to be discreet, they can just take that and nobody knows, you know, whether it's an insulin pen, our regular pen.

00;33;29;22 - 00;33;46;00

Cary Hall

Yeah. You, you honestly when you look at it, let me have it for a second. When you look at this, I mean, look at this. That's about the size of a magic marker That's really about the size of it. And he had it his pocket right there. And I, I thought it was an actual pen and this is what it looks like.

00;33;46;00 - 00;33;59;00

Cary Hall

So this is pretty simple, remarkable. I mean, the size of that and what it does is and it's got All right, look, it's got a phone app. So let's talk about the phone app. Sure. So everybody likes phone apps. Okay.

00;33;59;02 - 00;34;15;21

Ron Hoyler

So we have a pen phone app where this data is going to come to your phone. You click on the app, it's going to open it up, you know, give you the dose. It's very much like what we call a pump in a pen and it allows you to have your settings that your doctors prescribed for your dosing.

00;34;15;26 - 00;34;18;24

Ron Hoyler

It will calculate that for you so you don't have to do the math.

00;34;19;01 - 00;34;37;15

Cary Hall

Wow. So for those of us that are not good at math, that'd be me. Okay? If I had this issue, I wouldn't have to deal with that. That's true. It's all there. So now you know, again, now we're back to a child. Okay? Or an adult. You know this trying to do the injections. This changes the whole ballgame or.

00;34;37;18 - 00;35;08;02

Ron Hoyler

It syncs up with a sensor so that, you know, your blood sugar, it's going to be able to collect all that data. It'll tell you if you need a correction because your blood sugar is running high. And really, best of all, we've been talking about how you can share it with family members or caregivers, but you can simply hit report here and it'll create a report and then you can touch the share button and you can either email it or you can fax it to your doctor's office.

00;35;08;04 - 00;35;27;01

Cary Hall

That's amazing. So one of the problems I've heard both of you talk about this when we were meeting with the good folks at Blue Cross is when when the Type one diabetic goes into the doctor's office and let's say it's a parent with the child and the doctor is like, does the agency and have you been taking your you did this, do it.

00;35;27;02 - 00;35;27;15

Cary Hall

Go ahead.

00;35;27;22 - 00;36;01;03

Ron Hoyler

So, first of all, when we say Quincy, A-1 C is a measurement that doctors use to get a general gauge of how a person's blood sugar has been over the last months, it's again, a very much like the average. And generally, if we're shooting for an agency of 7%, that means we have a pretty good blood sugar. However, that can be misleading because as an average, if half of your blood sugars are very high and half of them are very low, you're going to end up having a good agency.

00;36;01;05 - 00;36;24;00

Ron Hoyler

However, that wouldn't translate into good diabetes control. And so what we really are leaning more towards is the time and range where you're in that healthy range with your blood sugars and that's what you're able to see now with this data that we can collect and we can see it in a way that tells how we can effectively or more successfully manage the diabetes.

00;36;24;03 - 00;36;40;17

Cary Hall

So basically, Ed, what's happening is the doctors getting real time data and when you go into your doctor visit, he doesn't have to ask you the question. He's got the answers because he's sitting there looking at the actual data. And I assume the pump does exactly the same. It feeds the data to the doctor as well.

00;36;40;19 - 00;36;47;24

Ed Clasby

Correct? Correct. And some doctors have referred to the downloads as a diabetic x ray. And how are you really like that?

00;36;47;24 - 00;36;49;05

Cary Hall

A diabetic x ray.

00;36;49;06 - 00;37;05;17

Ed Clasby

Okay. All right. Yes. How are you going to treat a patient if you don't have the data? And if you ask anybody if you ask me what I have for breakfast this morning, I can't remember. So I'm supposed to remember what type of or what am I under dosing for my insulin a couple of weeks ago? I'm not going to remember it.

00;37;05;17 - 00;37;16;18

Ed Clasby

And that's the brilliance of this device, is it's going to track that, give the physician the data that they need to coach and instruct the patient to get to their overall best health.

00;37;16;18 - 00;37;25;07

Cary Hall

And we've got about 30 seconds left here, but I want to make something very clear, Ed, these products are both covered by health insurance. Am I correct on that?

00;37;25;10 - 00;37;26;07

Ed Clasby

Yes, sir.

00;37;26;09 - 00;37;35;19

Cary Hall

They are covered, whether you're on Medicare, whether you're on Medicaid, or whether you're on an AC policy or group policy, these are all covered by health insurance across the country.

00;37;35;19 - 00;37;39;06

Ed Clasby

Correct The majority carry the majority. Yes.

00;37;39;06 - 00;37;56;05

Cary Hall

Okay. Almost all the carriers cover this that they don't you can certainly find out and they'll get you somebody that does. But the point is, you don't have to pay for this out of pocket, folks. It's it's part of what is covered by health insurance plans throughout the country, almost universally. So, first of all, thank you both for doing this today.

00;37;56;09 - 00;37;57;19

Ron Hoyler

Okay, Carrie, thank you for having.

00;37;57;19 - 00;38;15;10

Cary Hall

Long time to get this thing. But we did it. And I will tell you something. I think this is going to make a big difference to a lot of you out there. I do these kind of shows for a reason like this. This information is available to the medical community. It's available to the insurance community. Some of the people in the insurance community don't even know about this.

00;38;15;10 - 00;38;32;02

Cary Hall

Okay. The purpose of doing this kind of broadcast is to educate the public so that you can go back to your doctor, you can go back to your physician, you can go back to your clinic, whatever it may be. And you can say, hey, I heard about this Medtronic pump. I went up on their website, I really like this.

00;38;32;02 - 00;38;47;25

Cary Hall

I want to know about this. How do I get one? Or I heard about that pin. I want to know about how I get that pin. I really like that. I can put it in my pocket. It's convenient. It's easy. That's the purpose and the whole purpose behind all of this is better. Diabetes management and being able to live a normal life.

00;38;47;25 - 00;39;14;13

Cary Hall

That's what we're trying to accomplish here. That's the purpose behind doing these shows, is to educate you as to how you can better manage your health care. That's what America's Healthcare Advocate does. Thank you for listening today. We greatly appreciate it. Again, the website, if you want information, Medtronic Tor.com. The phone number 877576 6641 And now I leave you with this thought from Dr. Albert Einstein, the one who follows the crowd.

00;39;14;13 - 00;39;33;00

Cary Hall

You usually get no further than the crowd. The one who walks alone is likely to find himself in places no one has ever been. Remember, friends. It's a funny thing about life if you refuse to accept anything but the very best, you most often get it. Thank you for listening to America's Healthcare Advocate broadcasting here on the HIA Radio Network.

00;39;33;02 - 00;39;36;16

Cary Hall

Coast to Coast across the USA, Goodbye, America.