Insulet Reports 1Q 2013 Results: New Pod Statement

"We are pleased with the initial launch of the new, smaller and lighter OmniPod in the U.S.," said Duane DeSisto, President and Chief Executive Officer of Insulet.  "Our customers and healthcare professionals have been sharing their positive feedback about the reduced size, ease of use and change to the insulin on board calculation.  Demand for the new OmniPod has been tremendous with referrals and initial shipments up by more than 40% over the last two months as compared to the prior year.  In the coming weeks, we expect to begin converting the existing customer base to the new OmniPod and continue to expect the transition to be completed by the end of the third quarter."

The rest of the report is here.

Update on Tuesday, May 7, 2013 at 10:55AM by Scott Benner

The following is from the May 6, 2013 Insulet Earnings Call. The quote was brought to my attention by the TuDiabetes User, Erik. I then listened to the call to verify the quote as accurate. It can be found 05:47 into the call.

"With this significant uptick in demand, we did make the decision to delay the transition of existing customers for approximately 90 days in order to build additional OmniPod supply. While the manufacturing process continues to improve, we had an unexpected component issue that resulted in lower than planned production in the latter part of Q1. While this component issue was quickly identified, and remedied in conjunction with both Flextronics and the supplier, we determined it most prudent to build inventory and insure that both manufacturing lines were operating efficiently before we commence the transition of over 45 thousand customers to the new OmniPod. At this point, we expect that conversion will start in the next few weeks, and remain confident that nearly all customer will be transitioned by the end of the third quarter."

This Picture Makes Me Smile

Do you see Arden in the middle of the purple glowing smoke, the one wearing the hat. Arden danced the night away on Saturday during her first Bar Mitzvah without a care in the world. I just wanted to take a second to tell everyone how grateful my family is for the technology that makes moments like this better. Without Arden's DexCom G4 I would have interrupted her fun countless times during the evening. Each time taking her from the moment and drawing attention to her diabetes. Instead, we were able to monitor her post meal BGs from across the room and when she did require a bolus of insulin, I never took her OmniPod PDM out of my pocket. 

Wireless. Tubleless. Goodness.

Knowing that Arden was safe, carefree and completely unencumbered by diabetes while she danced is a feeling that may be lost on other parents, but I think that every parent of a child with type I will look at his photo and smile along with me. As a father, I found this moment to be completely joyous - nothing beats seeing my kids live without limits.

Have a great week!

Scott

New OmniPod Wherefore Art Thou?

I can remember bugging my parents unmercifully one Christmas for the Omnibot robot from Tomy. I couldn't think of anything else in the months leading up to December 25th. I was hooked the very first time that I saw the Omnibot commercial on television... my wildest dreams were about to come true!

I feel like that little kid again today as I patiently wait for the new OmniPod to arrive at our front door.

Insulet's phone message: It's not super cool like the commercial you just watched but Insulet has recorded an audio message for their customers. You can hear the message at my link or by dialing (888)-7-GET-POD.

Questions about the new OmniPod

I'm sure you've noticed that some people are beginning to receive the new OmniPod. Arden hasn't received hers yet, but as soon as she does I'll begin to make notes about our experience so that I can pass my thoughts on to you.

Until that time, and let's hope it's soon... if you have any questions about the new OmniPod that you would like me to address please leave them in this discussion thread. Hopefully, I'll be answering them before Christmas.

Wierd side note: I knew that I wanted to write about my desire to own the Omnibot robot as a child. When I began to consider this post I, no lie, I couldn't remember the name of the robot - only what it looked like. After some Googling I found an image and couldn't believe that my robot, from all of those years ago, was called the Omnibot. That's the kind of stuff Alanis Morissette writes songs about, don't cha think?

Update on Monday, March 18, 2013 at 9:40PM by Scott Benner

My new book, "Life Is Short, Laundry Is Eternal' is available now - Amazon/Kindle - Barnes&Noble/Nook 

Wrong Button

I learned a valuable lesson about diabetes blogging a few years ago. One of my readers told me that there are times when reading caregiver blogs can make her feel like a failure because so many of them only talk about what goes right... I try not to do that anymore.

The other night, for the first time in over six years, I pushed the wrong button. As you can see on the DexCom graph above, Arden was having a bit of trouble with lows after she went to bed. I was able to avoid waking her prior to midnight by shutting off her basal insulin for 30 minutes. When her BG began to fall again sometime around one in the morning, I decided to restrict her basal once more, this time for one hour.

I've looked at the menus a bunch since this happened but I still can't figure out how I made this mistake, but I certainly did. To make matters worse I didn't hear the DexCom alarm until around five in the morning. When I walked into her room and picked up the Dex, I couldn't believe what I saw, "INSULIN DELIVERY SUSPENDED". I somehow shut off Arden's insulin delivery instead of setting a temp basal. I don't know how. I felt sick when I learned what I had done.

I immediately turned her insulin back on, tested and delivered a bolus. Then set a positive temp basal to aide the situation. It took almost four hours for me to get her BG back to where we want it and Arden was two and a half hours late for school. 

I think that it's very important that we all recognize and accept that we can't be perfect all of the time and that we are going to make mistakes. This one was just my most recent. Please try not to beat yourself up too much when something like this happens (I know you will), you're doing a great job and you're doing so under difficult circumstances. I'm very proud of you, be proud of yourself.

I pushed the wrong button.

Update on Monday, March 18, 2013 at 9:43PM by Scott Benner

My new book, "Life Is Short, Laundry Is Eternal' is available now - Amazon/Kindle - Barnes&Noble/Nook 

Video: Behind the New OmniPod System

Insulet has released a promotional video describing their new OmniPod.

I hope that Arden's arrive soon, I can't wait to see her with a smaller pod.