Samsung Reveals ‘Game-Changer’ Blood Glucose Monitoring To Outdo Apple Watch – Forbes
Republished Jan. 26 with details of what the technology will mean and when it might launch.Health monitoring is a key part of technology, from the brilliant Oura Ring to the many health and fitness features on the Apple Watch. Now, Samsung has announced that it is working on a feature many have seen as the holy grail for wearable tech: a non-invasive continuous glucose monitor. There was no hint at a release date (not least because it’s very hard to do, it seems) but reports are suggesting when it might be.Samsung Galaxy Watch6—will a future watch offer glucose monitoring?“The fact that Samsung is happy to talk about non-invasive blood glucose monitoring suggests that the company is confident it’s going to work—and soon,” commented Tom’s Guide. More on what that might mean for the release date below.Several years ago, Jeff Williams, Apple’s Chief Operating Officer told me that measuring blood glucose through the skin, without penetrating the skin, was very difficult to achieve accurately. Of course, Williams did not in any way say Apple was working on such a technology, though it’s widely believed that it is.Currently, continuous glucose monitors, or CGMs, such as gadgets from Lingo and Dexcom, require a sensor to go through the skin and this invasive technique is thought to put many off from considering measuring their glucose levels.I’ve tried the Lingo unit and for the record, it really doesn’t hurt when it’s applied, but even so, I can see why people find it offputting. Right now, glucose monitors are mostly used by people with diabetes to help stay in a healthy range, but it’s a metric that could be beneficial much more widely, helping people understand the spikes in glucose that can happen because of activity or food intake, for instance. So, the news from Samsung could be meaningful to everyone.In a news release, Dr Hon Pak, Samsung’s senior vice president and head of its digital health team, revealed that as part of the company’s ongoing work to reimagine healthcare, it was working on blood glucose.“In particular, blood glucose is a big area of focus for us, and Samsung has been working to develop a sensor algorithm that predicts early signs of diabetes – along with non-invasive blood glucose monitoring technology and continuous glucose monitoring-integrated nutrition coaching,” Dr Pak said.This is very big news. Apple is reportedly working on something similar for Apple Watch but there’s no official announcement about that. The fact that Dr Pak has announced this may indicate that the company is getting close.In a forum about health hosted in San Jose, California, Dr Pak talked more about this development, as reported by Android Authority.“What I’m really excited about is our team, as you may have assumed, we are working on a non-invasive optically-based continuous glucose monitor. I can’t tell you the time [of the launch], but I’m very excited about the progress we are making, and this, if we do it right, will be a game-changer.”Though there’s no date set, my feeling is that if this announcement is being made, that it will come in the near-to-medium future, that is, this year or next, I would guess.If so, it could beat Apple to the punch.Dr Pak did not say where this monitor would be, though I imagine it would be in a future Galaxy Watch first, possibly coming to the Galaxy Ring after that. It’s possible it could even be a standalone device at first, if the sensor couldn’t be made small enough initially. And Dr Pak revealed that the sensor is optical, so it could perhaps nestle in with the other ones on the base of the watch.As to other reports of when it might surface, Tom’s Guide says that it, “isn’t something Samsung would discuss in such definitive terms if it was only possible, and that in turn suggests it could be something we see debut this year with the Galaxy Watch 8.”Which would likely mean August 2025, and I’d agree with that. Though the report goes on, “A poorly implemented solution is actually worse than no solution at all. The last thing you want to do is to lull diabetics into a false sense of security with unreliable measurements. For that reason, while it’s possible, we’ll see the feature introduced in some form in the Galaxy Watch … it wouldn’t be surprising if the holy grail of continuous glucose monitoring slips to the Galaxy Watch 9 or later.”I hear that reasoning, but Dr Pak is smart, and I don’t think he’d have teased that the company is happy with the way the development is going if he wasn’t confident it would be sooner rather than later.I believe that if everything progresses as Dr Pak hopes, we should expect the sensor to debut some time this year.One Community. Many Voices. Create a free account to share your thoughts. Our community is about connecting people through open and thoughtful conversations. We want our readers to share their views and exchange ideas and facts in a safe space.In order to do so, please follow the posting rules in our site’s Terms of Service. We’ve summarized some of those key rules below. 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