Many families from deprived backgrounds are unable to make the most of NHS-provided diabetes technology because they are unable to afford smartphones, charity workers and healthcare professionals have said.
The NHS provides continuous glucose monitors (CGMs) for people with type 1 diabetes. The device allows glucose levels to be checked without finger-prick blood tests.
The device is particularly important for young children with type 1 diabetes as it enables parents and nurses to monitor glucose levels throughout the night and day.
Type 1 diabetes tends to be diagnosed in childhood, and there are about 32,000 children in the UK living with the condition.
Although CGMs are compatible with receivers that are provided with the devices, healthcare professionals and charity workers have said when managing type 1 diabetes, especially in small children, using CGM devices with smartphones are necessary.
Gillian Adams, a paediatric diabetes specialist nurse at Ealing hospital, west London, said using a smartphone, rather than a receiver, with a CGM device was essential for the management of young children with type 1 diabetes.
“It can be distressing and more difficult for a parent to manage their child’s glucose levels with just a receiver, as they can be anxious when the child is out of their sight, and without a smartphone they have no way of being able to track their glucose levels when they are away from them,” she said.
“With a receiver, the child has to have it with them at all times, which means that when they are at school, or at nursery, it is only through a smartphone that parents are able to track their glucose levels.”
Carolyn Goldhill, the founder of the charity Supporting Children with Diabetes, said it had distributed more than 500 smartphones to families with children with type 1 diabetes.
“The problem comes from the fact that a lot of children don’t have mobile phones. And children from deprived backgrounds certainly don’t have mobile phones, and no one is supplying them for them,” she said.
“We’ve morphed into this organisation that has been constantly bombarded with requests for mobile phones. I’ve managed to secure some … but those supplies are going to run out quite soon, and I don’t know yet whether I will be able to get more or whether I will be able to keep this charity going because I cannot afford to keep paying for these phones.
“I just think it’s appalling that the NHS will go so far to provide the continuous glucose monitors but they don’t think about the problems for children from poor backgrounds. So what you end up with is a two-tiered system, whereby the children who can afford a mobile phone would be fine but those parents who are struggling would have to go back to pricking. There is literally no other alternative.”
Shaheda, 24, from Waltham Forest in east London, whose four-year-old daughter, Hodan Ahmed, has been diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, said without the charity she would not have been able to afford an extra smartphone.
Shaheda, who did not want to give her surname, said: “The issue was that now [my daughter] has started school full-time, so if I’m not with her physically I cannot see her readings. But now she has got the extra smartphone [through the charity] it has made life easier.”
A spokesperson for Dexcom, one of the manufacturers of the devices, said: “Our goal is to simplify and improve diabetes management for every person with diabetes. Dexcom’s real-time continuous glucose monitoring systems connect to a variety of mobile handsets via a mobile app from a range of providers including Apple, Samsung, Google and Motorola. We also offer receivers. Both the mobile app and receivers are highly effective at tracking glucose levels.
“We’re passionate about access to CGM and work closely with the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence and other key stakeholders to expand access.”
NHS England declined to comment becauseit did not manufacture the devices.
