Diabetes: A Widespread Public Health Concern With Rising Prevalence

Diabetes is the most common endocrine disorder. It is a globally spread public health concern that has potentially serious consequences. A person with Diabetes undergoes spikes in blood sugar levels, and these spikes can sometimes reach life-threatening levels. 

Diabetes is categorized into the following types: Type 1 Diabetes, Type 2 Diabetes, Gestational Diabetes, and Prediabetes. Among these, Type 2 has the highest prevalence. In Type 2, an individual’s body either produces insufficient insulin or develops insulin resistance. Type 1 Diabetes, also called Insulin-dependent Diabetes or Juvenile Diabetes, is a chronic illness in which the pancreas fails to produce sufficient insulin independently.

The World Health Organization states that the number of individuals with Diabetes has increased exponentially – with diagnosed cases rising from 108 million in 1980 to 422 million as of 2014. This constant rise in Diabetes prevalence in the past decades can be attributed to an increase in the geriatric and obese population, a lack of daily physical exercise, globalization, changing lifestyles in rural regions and cities, and bad eating habits.

There are several treatment options available today for Diabetes. Some of these include oral medicines (mainly for Type 2 patients), lifestyle modifications consisting of exercise and a healthy diet, and most importantly -insulin (mainly for Type 1 patients). Diabetes therapy commenced with the use of a syringe for injecting insulin, which then evolved into insulin pumps, insulin pens, cloud-based data systems, sensor-augmented pumps, and hybrid closed-loop systems, thus transforming the Diabetes Care Market.

Key companies that offer insulin syringes include Injekt® series, Omnifix® series, NIPRO (GLUCOPRO Insulin Syringe), B. Braun Melsungen AG (Omnican® series, Omnifix® series, and Injekt® series, Medline Industries Inc. (Medline Insulin Safety Syringes), Abbott Laboratories (FreeStyle Precision Insulin Syringes), among others.

Key companies that offer first-generation insulin pens and prefilled pens include Sanofi (SoloSTAR & AllStar), Humalog Pen, Eli Lilly (Kwikpen), Novo Nordisk (FlexTouch & NovoPen family).

Key companies that offer insulin pump models include Roche ( Accu-Chek Solo Micropump), Ypsomed (mylife YpsoPump), SOOIL (DANA R), Cellnovo, Insulet (OmniPod), Tandem (t:Slim), and Medtronic (MiniMed).

The ultimate ambition of the Diabetes treatments option is to make an artificial pancreas that is fully implantable and will deliver insulin without much human interference, thus improving the quality of life of Diabetes patients. Companies like EoFlow, Insulet Corp, Dexcom, Bigfoot Biomedical, Diabeloop, Beta Bionics, and many others have been experimenting continuously to bring this goal into reality.

The development and launch of products by such companies could revolutionize the Diabetes treatment market and can become the next big step in the evolution of Diabetes Management.

Resources:Diabetes Management – An Analysis of Medical Devices and Key Players, By Delveinsight.