Optical Coherence Tomography Based Non-invasive Glucose Monitoring

Continuous, non-invasive, glucose monitoring has great potential as a tool for guiding insulin treatment in diabetics and in critical care patients. Many optical techniques have been applied to solve this problem, but to date none have achieved the sensitivity, accuracy, or specificity required (which for existing home meters is +/- 15%). Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) is an emerging technology that has been applied to high depth resolution imaging (~ 10 microns) of tissue. OCT is analogous to a sonogram where back reflected light, rather than sound, is used to form an image. The low coherence of the light used is what gives OCT it's high imaging resolution. We propose to use this technique in a sensing, rather than an imaging mode. In this application, the scattering properties of tissue can be measured with a high degree of accuracy with very tight localization. Since the scattering coefficient of skin tissue varies with glucose level, this technique shows great promise as a continuous, non-invasive glucose monitor.