Rick Doubleday Discusses Bringing the Dexcom CGM to Medicare Beneficiaries

Rick Doubleday is the executive vice president, and chief commercial officer at Dexcom. He is responsible for the sales, marketing and customer service functions. Previously, Doubleday led all sales and marketing functions for the company, driving the acceleration of worldwide awareness and adoption of Dexcom continuous glucose monitoring (CGM). Doubleday visited The American Journal of Managed Care^® to discuss bringing the Dexcom G5 to Medicare beneficiaries.

Transcript

Can you describe how Medicare beneficiaries have responded to the news about reimbursement for the Dexcom G5? What steps has Dexcom taken to respond to demand?

Medicare beneficiaries are thrilled that the Dexcom G5 is now being reimbursed [to] those beneficiaries that have diabetes. We are the first one to get a class for Medicare beneficiaries to actually get continuous glucose monitoring. Continuous glucose monitoring is a tool that individuals with diabetes using insulin can actually get continuous glucose readings which helps them better manage their disease. It has alerts and alarms which will alert them when they are going either high or low, so these beneficiaries who frequently suffer from hypoglycemia, hypo-unaware, are thrilled that they now have access to this technology.

How is the Medicare reimbursement process going and how has Dexcom set itself up to respond to demand?

Medicare reimbursement is going well, one thing that everyone has to remember is that we are about 18 months ahead of when we expected to get the reimbursement and so, we’re playing catch-up. We would all like the beneficiaries to be getting these devices faster than they are, but we have ramped a team to be able to support them and we are continuously growing the number of patients that are getting the device.

Will Medicare revisit the decision to not allow beneficiaries to use CGM with their smartphone? What is Dexcom doing to facilitate this?

Dexcom is always the first to the market, and we’re the first to actually get the Medicare reimbursement. And we’re thrilled that CMS made a decision to cover continuous glucose monitoring. As part of that ruling, we’re classified as a Medicare part B, which is a durable medical equipment. Part of that is you have to use the durable device, which is the receiver, and we are getting the benefit to patients. We are actively working with CMS to try and open up access to the smartphone. We believe that it’s very important for these beneficiaries to have the ability to use their smartphones. We will continue to work on this and when there’s more information we will absolutely share it with these beneficiaries.