The new Dexcom G7 is finally approved for use in Canada.
After being diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes at three years old, Hayley Boyachek has spent countless hours pricking her fingers and then inserting her continuous glucose monitor (CGM) device, the Dexcom G6.
Before they had the CGM device, Heidi Boyachek, Hayley’s mom, was waking up multiple times every night to check her daughter’s blood sugar levels and spent most days anxious about it, not knowing if she was experiencing a low or high.
When a person with Type 1 Diabetes’s blood sugar is too low, they can go unconscious, have a seizure, go into a coma, or die. If it’s too high, they can go into diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA), which is when the body starts filling with acid and goes into a coma. This can also lead to death. Both extremes also come with their own mental side effects.
With the CGM device, Heidi can sleep through the night — and so can Hayley. The device is composed of tiny disposable sensors that sit just beneath the skin, attached to a small wearable pack. The unit measures the amount of sugar in the blood every couple of minutes and sends that reading to a smart phone app, letting the person in charge know if everything is OK. The CGM device also gives warnings when the person’s blood sugar is too high or too low.
The new Dexcom G7 is a smaller sensor than the G6. It still needs to be changed every 10 days, but unlike the Dexcom G6, which had a two-hour warm-up period after insertion, the G7 has a 30-minute warm-up period.
“That was always nerve wracking for us,” said Heidi. “Hayley had lots of lows during [the two-hour warm-up period] because you don’t get readings during it.”
The Dexcom G7 is also an all-in-one device as opposed to the G6, which had a transmitter Heidi had to remove and replace every 10 days. This new design means the device costs less, as additional transmitters aren’t needed. The new device is also 60 per cent smaller than the G6 and gives the family a 12-hour grace period for changing it.
The Dexcom G7 is approved for children to wear on the back of their arm. Though Hayley has worn hers there for a while, the G6 wasn’t approved for that. Heidi said the arm is the best location — there, the device is out of the way and Hayley doesn’t feel the prick as much as she does on her tummy.
“It truly is a lifeline for us to be able to get an update every five minutes,” said Heidi. “We can see the trend in which way her glucose is moving. It gives Hayley more independence too not having to stop and check her blood sugar levels every 10 minutes. I really can’t picture life without one.”
