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Comment by pacman2 | Hacker News Reader

I find some of the this vague in this announcement. Non invasive BGM is the "holy grail" in this field. Tons of companies have failed after big investments. Some scammers are out there they claim since decades they solved the problem. I would be curious about peer reviewed publications of their technology.

A friend of mine is working on this too. Close to market. He is the only one that regularly published peer reviewed publications on this topic.

In fact, I remember I have written an SBIR grant proposal on the technology that was evaluated by an idiot who googled one of the components, realized a single unit (as compared to 10000 units) would cost 50 grant and rejected it based on the claim that the technology would be too expensive in practice. I had written in the proposal that, produced in quantities, the cost of this item is in the mid 3 dollar digits per unit. An idiot and google are a very dangerous combination, even at the NIH.

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I have a counter-story.

When I started my Phd in 2011, one professor, an absolute top player in the field and prof in a top tier university, revealed that he had patented a fully functional prototype a few years back, which allowed similar cheap non-stick measurement of glucose (i think this was on a principle similar to pulse oximetry rather than RF).

The patent was swiftly bought by a large pharmaceutical company and "buried", in order to protect sales of blood-sticks; by far the main source of profit in diabetic devices (his words).

How do you bury a patent? They are all published, aren't they?

When he says bury what he means is that no one can use it to build something. The company just holds it to prevent everyone else from using the idea.

Sigh. Patents should really be use-it-or-lose-it.

I'd love to know the patent number just to see how it works. I wonder if there are countries you could build and sell the device in?

Doubt it. There are so many issues with any technology regarding non-invasive. Is it still accurate if the individual has a fever? etc. etc. There were at least 50 companies that tried to build such devices, some start-ups had funding in the 50-100 million USD range - and failed. Samsung abandoned it. Apple is rumored to work on it.

Also, without clinical trials you really can't claim this device is reliable. You would also have to compare to real blood glucose and not the finger prick test.

Forgive my ignorance but, isn't a finger prick measuring real blood glucose? Or are you referring to a more long term/average a1c? (Or is there something in between that I just don't know about?)

"Real" blood glucose is glucose as measured by a reference standard device, like the YSI 2500, arterial blood gas machine etc. Finger pricks are accurate to within ~15% of the real blood sugar, and reference machines like the YSI are accurate to within ~1%.

Exactly. And I doubt that this device is used in any lab, except in a clinical lab setting. I have seen it in clinical trials. Focus on the word "arterial blood", this gives you an idea. :-)

Sure, it's a very bulky device and expensive to run! But, when you're talking about 'real' blood glucose, it's the gold standard that you need to use to pass regulatory scrutiny.

Sounds like you didn't idiot-proof your proposal. A lot of good paper writing guidelines, like explain value of contribution fast and early, could be phrased as idiot-proofing.

Maybe. But maybe you don't know how SBIR grants work. I consider them highly corrupt and I was told by people who got them how they got them and they even advised me, not to waste my time (two person, both hat P1 and P2).

The solicitation was for non-invasive BGM. Of the accepted proposals, nothing came out. Big surprise. At least I got a very high rating for "originality" of our approach.

You're right, I don't know anything about your specific case.

I’ve re-read your last paragraph a few times but I’m still confused (tho intrigued). Fancy re-wording it?

I think they mean the NIH grant reviewer dismissed the grant request on the basis that the technology was too expensive - ignoring that the research was intended to catalyze mass production which would have made the technology economical. Thus missing the point of the grant proposal.

Yes. Basically. This item is available for a lab setting with many fancy options. Cost: 50.000 USD

If 10.000 units of a customized simple version are ordered, the cost is 500 USD, give or take a few hundred dollars. This was not my estimate, this was the quote given by a company.

PS: Forwarded it to my buddy (Professor).

Quote: "interesting but approach wont work"

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