Technological advances in the treatment of diabetes mellitus: better bioengineering begets benefits in glucose measurement, the artificial pancreas, and insulin delivery.

The management of type 1 diabetes is being advanced by innovations in glucose measurement, development of an artificial pancreas, and in alternate routes of insulin delivery. Emerging technologies will allow insulin to be delivered more effectively. In the future, patients with type 1 diabetes will receive insulin in optimal quantities (because of more information about blood glucose values) at optimal times (because of better integration of blood glucose values with appropriate insulin dosages) by way of optimal routes into the body (because of needle-free routes of administration) in order to achieve optimal blood glucose control. Emerging technologies for improved care of patients with type 1 diabetes include: 1. new methods for monitoring glucose, including noninvasive, minimally invasive, continuous, and alternate site measurement technologies; 2. new methods for integrating glucose values and insulin dosages, known as the artificial pancreas; and 3. new routes of insulin administration, including inhaled, oral, buccal, nasal, and transdermal drug delivery systems. These new technologies will facilitate proper treatment of type 1 diabetes and improve the lives of affected patients.