Dexcom’s CEO has already created some magic for traders.
Final Monday, the maker of steady glucose screens for folks battling diabetes introduced its preliminary fourth-quarter monetary outcomes stating that it expects to garner no less than $1.03 billion within the quarter that ended December 31, a 26% soar over the identical interval a 12 months in the past.
However the firm’s CEO — Kevin Sayer, a diabetic himself — isn’t taking any victory laps. In an interview in San Francisco in the course of the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Convention, Sayer mentioned there’s way more to realize. Foremost amongst them is to make the corporate’s glucose sensing potential extra rapidly and extensively accessible to folks, together with to sort 2 diabetes sufferers. Most sufferers who use steady glucose screens to higher management their blood glucose ranges are sort 1 diabetes sufferers needing insulin however a wider inhabitants of diabetics may profit from Dexcom’s gadgets, per Sayer.
In truth, Dexcom has developed a shopper gadget — known as Stelo — that it’ll market on to Kind 2 diabetes sufferers who are usually not on insulin remedy. Dexcom has already submitted the appliance with the FDA and expects to launch it subsequent summer time.
Whereas he has management over among the inner choices on product and operations, in the case of the vagaries of the healthcare business, Sayer would fortunately wield a magic wand to realize his needs. And paramount amongst that’s getting his firm’s gadgets rapidly to those that want it.
“I do suppose having access to merchandise continues to be troublesome for folks and understanding how this entire system works. I might like to wave a magic wand and try this,” he mentioned.
However it’s not solely about accessibility and decreasing complexity in healthcare so that individuals can merely get the care they want when they should
Sayer needs to wave a wand to rework reimbursement coverage.
“I might like to see us pay for [preventive] drugs relatively than taking good care of folks once they’re sick,” Sayer mentioned.
He added that he believes the Dexcom G7 CGM would work very nicely for pregnant girls with gestational diabetes however that might require pitching “our case to payers” and doing research.
“We imagine our instrument on the being pregnant aspect may finally turn out to be a diagnostic to foretell this kind of situation. However once more, a bunch of finding out, a bunch of labor. And so I’d like to see the system pay for wellness. I’d like to see the system pay for [preventive] drugs relatively than, notably within the US, simply cope with ‘Uh oh, this particular person’s sick, let’s throw cash at it.’”
Sayer mentioned he hopes employers can play a job in making preventive drugs an ordinary, however nearly instantly acknowledged the difficulties forward.
“And employers may drive that probably on their finish, however employers try to scale back their prices, and in all equity, this entire system with the best way rebates and reductions or all the things work, I don’t know that anyone is aware of…” he trailed off with out ending his thought.
The inference, nonetheless, is obvious: I’m CEO of a $4 billion firm and but really feel hamstrung by an opaque system with center males who might not essentially have the curiosity of sufferers at coronary heart.
For that to alter, all of us want a magic wand for healthcare. Or realistically perhaps Congress must wield its energy.
Photograph: undefined undefined, Getty Photos
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