ZURICH, July 9, 2024 (BSS/AFP) - Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche said 
Tuesday it would soon begin marketing a device that uses artificial 
intelligence to predict possible low blood sugar events during the night and 
thus help sufferers of diabetes sleep without worry.

Diabetes is a chronic, metabolic disease characterised by elevated blood 
sugar levels that is treated with insulin injections. Sufferers can also have 
problems with episodes of low blood sugar levels -- hypoglycaemia -- during 
the night that disrupt their sleep, some requiring medical intervention.

Roche said its latest continuous glucose monitor, a wearable sensor, takes 
readings of blood sugar levels every five minutes and is paired with an AI 
app. 

"Its integrated AI-enabled predictive algorithms indicate hypoglycaemia risk 
within the next 30 minutes, continuously forecast how glucose levels will 
develop within the next two hours, and estimate the risk of nocturnal 
hypoglycaemia," it said.

The technology enables "proactive intervention before glucose levels require 
immediate attention" and "is designed to alleviate ... concerns about 
nighttime hypoglycaemia and lower its risk," added Roche.

It said the predictive AI algorithms exceeded high performance requirements 
in terms of accuracy and that it judged the system meets European health and 
safety standards.

While generative AI applications like ChatGPT have garnered the most public 
attention, artificial intelligence has been increasingly deployed in a number 
of areas like language translation and image recognition, including to aid 
medical professionals. 

More than 422 million people suffer from diabetes across the world in 2014, 
according to the World Health Organization, with rising levels of obesity 
driving rising numbers of type 2 diabetes, which occurs when the body becomes 
resistant to insulin or doesn't make enough insulin.