Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Jeff Dempsey on December 11, 2012 at 9:51am

Jake,

As a Mac convert (and loving it), I cannot agree more with you. When 5-10% of machines out there are Macs, and there are alternatives to using Windows on it, it becomes a business decision for the creators of the software.

On the testing front, I'm also looking at using Crossover, as it lets you run PC/Windows stuff in a window, without having to buy a copy of Windows.

It'll be over Christmas, and I'll let all y'all know.

Jeff

Permalink Reply by Jeff Dempsey on December 11, 2012 at 10:58am

OK, I checked... 10-15% of machines are Macs.

Permalink Reply by Jake on December 12, 2012 at 9:28am

If Crossover works id be very interested.. Heres the kicker.. Vendors cannot legally recommend virtualized machines (FDA again, its akin to offlabel prescribing)... but anecdotaly many try to make sure they do work... Have had very good luck with VirtualBox and diabetes apps... and Boot Camp. But wish more diabetes devices used FTDI based serial solutions which are smarter about not taking up unnecessary com ports.. and duplicate phantom com ports that cause issues..

Permalink Reply by Biomuse on December 11, 2012 at 9:57am

Thanks for this. I was wondering, because porting programs like these is at this point trivial from a technical standpoint.

On the face of it, it would seem to make more sense for these programs to be browser-based: one cross-platform interface, server-side control of accumulated data. But there are presumably all sorts of HIPAA issues with having encrypted medical data transfer "on the internet" >eyeroll< that inhibits this solution as well. FDA needs to get sufficiently IT-savvy so as to provide reasonable flexibility, because medicine's going in this direction generally; no stopping it.

Permalink Reply by Simon Carter on December 11, 2012 at 5:15pm

Definitely not trivial! But I agree with you on the FDA front.

Permalink Reply by Biomuse on December 11, 2012 at 7:32pm

Perhaps trivial is too strong a word. ;) But surely not a back-breaking moneypit? I would have assumed (perhaps wrongly) that something like Dexcom's statistics software is written at a high level, such that porting is mostly a matter of changing out some APIs & debugging for a week.

Permalink Reply by Mike on December 14, 2012 at 8:30pm

I like the idea of a browser based/cloud solution but unless you add wifi to the receiver you'd still need a USB cable to download the data from the device in order to get the data to a server. That would then require at least some local software unless they could also mount the device as a drive the way digital cameras do.

Permalink Reply by Jake on December 12, 2012 at 9:20am

Its not the actual porting thats expensive. its getting it re-approved through the FDA. Not saying portability is cheap, but thats not the main problem.. Its handing the FDA a check as if it were a new device thats the hard part.

Permalink Reply by Simon Carter on December 12, 2012 at 4:16pm

This is why I'm in favor of web-based reporting. Check my profile if interested.

Permalink Reply by Jake on December 13, 2012 at 10:22am

You still have the problem of approval.. Medtronic has this issue with Carelink.. It only technically works with an approved browser, with an approved version of java, with an approved shim/plugin to do the data exchange.. And thats not getting into the HIPAA issues.. I do know there is some headway on this. but just by going to a web based reporting system, your not going to bypass this with a CGMS...unless the user enters all data manually.. thats what a lot of IOS apps do to allow for charting in the US

Permalink Reply by Chas on December 13, 2012 at 8:07am

My issue is not MAC approvals - just that the G4 USB interface does not work with a MAC running windows 7. Where the 7 Plus appears to work. Why wouldn't Dexcom fix this. Sadly I cannot get an answer from Dexcom as I'm based in the UK and they will not deal with me. Can anyone registered with them in the US ask ?

Permalink Reply by Jake on December 13, 2012 at 10:23am

Ill see if i can talk to someone but technically their answer has to be.. We do not support the Mac... its not FDA approved to run under a virtual computer... That said. it doesn't mean they might not fix it.. but they cant tell you... From a technical point of view.. im wondering if you need a different serial to USB driver to make it work..

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