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"To echo some of the other comments, non-invasive glucose testing is a 'holy grail' of diabetes research efforts and would be hailed as a major breakthrough--something covered by major media outlets and aggresively pursued by all of big pharma and biotech."

No, it wouldn't. It is currently extremely difficult to find money for medical devices. We have a working prototype of a non-invasive blood glucose measurement system, including several peer reviewed publications. Yet, it seems impossible to find venture capital for this. The pay off in IT und Web Start-ups is just much better.

True, I am simpifying the issue. But medical device manufacturers should still be happy to take on new risks. See this article, even though it's an editorial:

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/17/opinion/the-myth-of-the-me...

It may be that existing products can simply be iteratively 'improved' and that doesn't cost much on the R&D side and is far less risky. I suppose market forces would favor the corporations that are protecting their existing revenue streams, at least in the short term. I would approach your university's IP office to discuss possibly funding the product. That's how large institutions do it. If you are in the private sector, then unfortunately it's up to you to 'sell' the idea to somebody. Maybe you could find some ventures capitalists who also 'coincidentally' happen to be diabetics?

Are you a company, a research group? Any references to those publications? A claim is much more credible when you are willing to give out proof to back it up ...

Well, have you tried IndieGoGo? It appears that they won't reject you as fraudsters, at least. :P

...and who is "we"? A claim like you're making might be better backed up with at least a link to your company or some of those publications.

This is one of those times where having identifiable information in your profile would help. Who are you that has such a device? Presumably it is patented. Perhaps this one [1] from MIT?

[1] https://www.google.com/patents/US8355767?dq=non-invasive+glu...

This seems neither new nor groundbreaking, however.

http://dst.sagepub.com/content/8/1/54.short

ETA: a 2011 review of the state of the art: http://knowledgetranslation.ca/sysrev/articles/project21/Ref...

There was even a glucose watch available on the market for several years in the US. It was pulled a few years ago, but the basic idea was sound. I do remember the device causing semi-serious skin irritation in many people though.

We've had ways to measure glicose non-invasively since the 90s, but since we're dealing with human lives - glucose monitoring is a matter of life and death for people with diabetes - such a device must be at least as accurate as finger-stick meters. None has come close so far.

This thing doesn't need to be anywhere near that accurate to be useful to someone. Fitness monitors are already pretty inaccurate but they're useful to get a general idea of your activity levels from day to day.

Trying to guess how many calories are in your food and adding them up each day isn't accurate, so a device that tries to measure it automatically based on your physiology only has to be that accurate. Maybe within 30% would still be useful to people tracking their fitness.

Obviously someone who is tracking their glucose or caloric intake for medical reasons should use FDA-approved medical devices and techniques for that, but those people aren't the target audience for this device.

I have no idea if this thing is legit or not, but calling it a scam because accurate non-invasive glucose measurement is a holy grail is completely missing the point of what the device is and what it's for.

Yep, the glucose thing is suspect, however, my working theory is this is exactly what Apple are up to. Some of the people they've hired are in precisely this area, and it's a suitably massive opportunity to cause an industry wide meltdown, even if a complete longshot.

I'm obviously going to be seriously disappointed by the iWatch with expectations like that.

I have the same expectations if Apple were to come out with an iWatch. I'm also absolutely sure they won't be achieving that with a couple of piezos and impedance sensors.

> As the saying goes, "extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof."

It's "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence", but it's not quoted enough regardless. So much pseudoscience could be avoided with reasonable expectations of proof.

Agree with what you are using as a rule of thumb. However there is the other point of view also.

Unexpected leaps forward in a scientific discipline, especially in medicine, should be met with great skepticism.

Many advances in medicine also seem to have been suppressed by vested interests: E.g., http://www.ted.com/talks/deborah_rhodes

for women with dense breast tissue is a sub population so it's not 3x as effective for everyone.

A much better example IMO is checklists. There cheap if somewhat demeaning and drastically reduce hospital infections among other things, but for various reasons there not in widesperad use. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Pronovost

Heard him on NPR last year.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40Z7iUHlLSY (5:49)

That's pretty clearly not the story here. This isn't some Robin Hood trying to save medical science by flying under the radar, but rather a shyster trying to avoid getting exposed.

There's a very simple way for Healbe to clear the air: release their supposed science. Publicly released scientific data has a much better chance of changing the status quo than a sketchy-looking crowdfunding campaign.

"non-invasive glucose testing is a 'holy grail' of diabetes research efforts and would be hailed as a major breakthrough--something covered by major media outlets and aggresively pursued by all of big pharma and biotech."

How is this any different than Occulus VR?

Forgive me if I've misunderstood, but that analogy seems as disparate as the leap in discovering non-invasive glucose testing itself...

Oculus had the backing of some of the foremost leaders in 3D graphical technology, verifying their goals, solutions, product and direction. This does not.

Well that's because Occulus presumably isn't a scam. But I don't see how seeking crowd funding in and of itself makes something inherently untrustworthy.

> But I don't see how seeking crowd funding in and of itself makes something inherently untrustworthy.

It doesn't. Those are your words.

Those reasons are not because occulus isn't a scam, they prove why its not a scam. If the "Healbe GoBe" had provided such validations from industry professionals, we wouldn't suspect that its a scam.