At the beginning of the year, there was a lot of news floating around the diabetic communities that Medicare would start providing coverage for continuous glucose monitoring systems. It was a huge day for type 1s because those CGM devices don’t come cheap, and having coverage from Medicare could take a lot of the pressure off families to pay for those expenses out of pocket. Unfortunately, we may have celebrated too soon.

Through the years, there has been a huge push for law makers to make some serious changes in how they handle diabetic supplies and the coverage that’s offered through Medicare. There has been years and years of advocacy by various groups. One of the biggest groups was JDRF, who has been focused on making serious ramifications to their rulings. JDRF was one of the groups that participated in the FDA Advisory Committee meeting that revolved around the Dexcom G5. In this advocacy meeting, there were over 35 patients, and they told their testimonies about how the CGM has changed their lives. They’ve also created two massive petitions which included over 10,000 signatures of people with diabetes and their families. All of this work played a huge role in getting the attention that the subject deserves. Continue Reading