Individualized, Technological Interventions for Diabetes Care in the COVID-19 Ward

Both hyperglycaemia and hypoglycaemia are associated with poor outcomes in patients with COVID-19. In these patients, severe hyperglycaemia after hospital admission is a strong predictor of death among non-ICU patients and inpatient hyperglycaemia is associated with an increased risk of death even in patients without diabetes. However, there is no current indication for blood glucose targets in hospitalized patients with COVID-19.

During the current COVID-19 pandemic, many hospitals worldwide have been overwhelmed and diabetes care centers are considering strategies based on technology to improve the outcomes in patients with diabetes and COVID-19 and to prevent healthcare workers' exposure, while optimizing the use of personal protective equipment (PPE). Point-of-care (POC) blood glucose measurements, in the context of a Covid-19 ward, with the need of frequent and intermittent blood glucose testing and the associated time burden for nursing and ancillary hospital staff workers, have shown significant limitations. From this point of view, continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) might represent an effective tool for blood glucose tracking in hospitalized patients. Consistently, in April 2020 the FDA authorized the use of CGM in patients with Covid-19, making CGM a potential favoured option in these patients. Companies, like Abbott and Dexcom, have supplied CGM systems to hospitals and provided education to use their devices effectively. The latest generation of CGM devices have alarms that can alert clinicians (or patients) to abnormal blood glucose values. Furthermore, CGMs that no longer require calibration with POC glucose testing (factory-calibrated) have the potential to decrease both nurse and patient burden associated with frequent POC glucose testing in the hospital.

Healthcare professional societies recommend insulin therapy in hospitalized patients with diabetes, and this holds especially true in Covid-19 patients. The conventional treatment approach involves multiple daily insulin injections (MDI) and includes the administration of rapid-acting insulin analogues before meals and a long-acting insulin analogue once a day. Such a complex regimen demands also multiple daily POC fingerstick for glucose control. Automated insulin delivery including CSII (continuous subcutaneous insulin infusion) has been considered in the hospital setting. In type 2 diabetes, insulin pump therapy induces better glycaemic control than MDI. A likely mechanism for the improved control on CSII is that the traditional large bolus injections of long-acting insulin required during MDI in type 2 diabetes are more erratically absorbed than the slow rapid-acting insulin infusion of CSII. In this respect, the same dose of insulin given via the basal rate of CSII induced better glycaemic control and higher circulating serum insulin concentrations than when given as an injection of long-acting insulin.

However, starting and managing CSII in the hospital setting by personnel and patients not adequately trained might represent a challenging barrier in a Covid-19 ward. Therefore, simpler and less sophisticated pumps might become more appropriate for prompt use by healthcare providers not specialized in diabetes treatment. V-Go® (Zealand Pharma A/S, Denmark) is a wearable insulin delivery device, fully mechanical without tubing or electronics, that does not require any programming. It delivers a continuous basal infusion of rapid-acting insulin (20, 30, or 40 units/24 h) and allows for up to 36 additional units for mealtime dosing in 2-unit increments. V-Go® is filled with fast-acting insulin and is worn like a patch on the skin using a hypoallergenic and latex-free adhesive. It is designed to be replaced every 24 h and is fully disposable. The implant of the device is easily obtained by the push of a button that inserts a 4.6-mm, 30-gauge stainless steel needle subcutaneously and starts the delivery of the continuous pre-set basal rate of insulin. Mealtime bolus insulin doses are administered on-demand by pressing the bolus-ready button and the bolus delivery button. Previous studies showed that switching patients from traditional insulin delivery modes to V-Go® was associated with significantly improved glycaemic control.

Therefore, the implementation of CGM and insulin infusion technologies in Covid-19 hospitals has the potential to improve clinical outcomes, help to protect frontline healthcare workers, and preserve PPE. However, because only observational retrospective data for CGM use and no data on insulin pump use are currently available, randomized controlled trials are needed to determine whether use of CGM and CSII systems in the hospital can be of significant help.

The aims of this study are to explore whether in patients hospitalized in COVID-19 non-ICU:

1. the use of CGM with a glucose telemetry system, compared with intermittent capillary blood glucose monitoring and/or
2. the use of a disposable insulin pump, compared with a conventional multiple daily insulin injection, may improve blood glucose control and COVID outcomes in patients with type 2 or secondary diabetes mellitus and facilitate diabetes management by health care providers.