Comparison of Real-time CGMS With Intermittently-scanned CGMS in Adolescents and Adults With Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus

Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus (T1DM) is characterized by absolute insulin deficiency. Despite multiple daily insulin injections, glycemic targets are usually not achieved in T1DM patients.Use of continuos glucose monitoring system (CGMS) is associated with improvement in glycemic control and reduction in glycemic variability in T1DM subjects. real-time CGMS (rt-CGMS) and intermittently scanned CGMS (is-CGMS) are the newer CGMS technologies. Previous studies have shown that in T1DM patients rt-CGMS is better than is-CGMS for glycemic control and reducing hypoglycemic episodes in patients with impaired awareness of hypoglycemia, but in patients with normal hypoglycemic awareness this is not well established. This study is a randomized control clinical cross over study of 6 months duration in patients of T1DM having normal hypoglycemic awareness, with age 15-40 years with a HbA1c range of 8-12%. Following a training period of 2 weeks, 80 participants will be randomized into 3 arms in a ratio of 1:1:2 in rt-CGMS, is-CGMS and SMBG (self monitoring of blood glucose) arms, respectively. For the first two groups Medtronic Guardian Connect Sensor 3 and Abott Freestyle Libre Sensor 2will be applied for 2 weeks, respectively; followed by a crossover at 3 months withapplication of is-CGMS and rt-CGMS, respectively in these groups for a further 2 weeks period. For rest of the study duration these patients in the rt-CGMS and is-CGMS group will be monitored through SMBG. The 3rd SMBG group will act as control. Short term blood glucose control will be assessed by Fructosamine assay in the 2 CGMS groups and long term control by HbA1C.