Non-invasive and real time blood glucose monitoring is the holy grail of diabetes. Afon Technology’s ground-breaking solution is a sensor which sits on the underside of the wrist and uses low power rf/microwave technology to track and record changes in blood glucose, in real time. It feeds back to a companion app on a smart device.
Afon Technology intends the first product release to be an indicator device which alerts the user when their blood glucose drifts into the hyperglycaemic or hypoglycaemic zones, affording better self-management for people with diabetes.
This device will also provide important trend data to a clinician who will use it to determine the ‘Time in Range’ of the wearer. Time in Range is an important measure of the person’s ability to control their blood glucose and maintain it within the normal zone. This will enable the clinician to better understand blood glucose behaviour over time, thereby enabling a more appropriate treatment.
Why do we need the Afon device?
The current ‘best option’ for a person with diabetes is a continuous glucose monitor (CGM). These are minimally invasive, with a microneedle recording blood glucose from the interstitial fluid. These have improved clinical management by providing continuous data and have improved self-management and user experience. However they are known to have a time lag from actual blood glucose change and they require replacing every 10-14 days. Our device will have no disposable or replaceable parts.
As well as being life changing for people with diabetes or pre-diabetes, we expect our device to be useful to sports people and anyone interested in health and nutrition.
The Afon Blood Glucose Sensor has undergone three rounds of testing at Profil, the world renowned diabetes research centre in Germany. Over the next year we will undertake a multi-phase trial of our disruptive technology at the Joint Clinical Research Facility (JCRF) at Swansea University. Other multi-site trials are also planned in 2023 ahead of commercialising our device in 2024.