Apparatus for optimizing a patient's insulin dosage regimen

1. An apparatus for optimizing a patient's insulin dosage regimen over time, comprising:

at least a first computer-readable memory for storing one or more components in a patient's present insulin dosage regimen and the patient's blood-glucose-level measurements determined at a plurality of times within a predefined period of time;

at least one data input for obtaining data corresponding to the patient's blood glucose-level measurements determined at the plurality of times;

a timer for monitoring the predetermined time period, the timer being incremented based on at least one of the passage of a predetermined increment of time and the receipt of at least one of the plurality of blood glucose-level measurements;

at least one processor operatively connected to the at least first computer-readable memory, the processor programmed at least to:

tag the plurality of blood glucose-level measurements with an identifier reflective of when the measurement was obtained;

determine, after obtaining one of the plurality of blood glucose-level measurements but before obtaining a subsequent blood glucose-level measurement, whether the obtained blood glucose-level measurement reflects a hypoglycemic event or a severe hypoglycemic event;

reduce at least one of the one or more components in the patient's insulin dosage regimen in response to the determination that the most recently obtained blood glucose-level measurement represents a severe hypoglycemic event;

reduce at least one of the one or more components in the patient's insulin dosage regimen in response to a determination that the most recently obtained blood glucose-level measurement results in an excessive number of hypoglycemic events during the predetermined time period; wherein the timer is reinitiated after the determination that there have been an excessive number of hypoglycaemic events over the predetermined amount of time; and

determine, at the end of the predetermined time period, from a plurality of the data corresponding to the patient's blood glucose-level measurements whether and by how much to vary at least one of the one or more components in the patient's insulin dosage regimen in order to maintain the patient's blood glucose-level measurements within a predefined range; wherein the timer is reinitiated after the determination of whether and by how much to vary at least one of the one or more components in the patient's present insulin dosage regimen.

2. The apparatus of claim 1 , further comprising a data entry device enabling a user to modify the identifier associated with each blood-glucose-level measurement data-input.

3. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the at least one processor further determines on a predefined schedule whether and by how much to vary at least one of the one or more components in the patient's present insulin dosage regimen.

4. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the at least one processor further:

determines, at the end of the predetermined time period, from the plurality of the data corresponding to the patient's blood-glucose-level measurements if the patient's blood-glucose level measurements fall within or outside of a predefined range, and

varying at least one of the one or more components in the patient's present insulin dosage regimen only if the patient's blood-glucose level measurements fall outside of the predefined range.

5. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the at least one processor further determines from the patient's blood-glucose-level measurements whether the patient's blood-glucose-level measurements represent a normal distribution.

6. The apparatus of claim 5 , wherein the determination of whether the patient's blood-glucose-level measurements represent a normal distribution comprises determining whether the third moment of the distribution of the patient's blood-glucose-level measurements fall within a predefined range.

7. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the one or more components in the patient's present insulin dosage regimen comprise a long-acting insulin dosage component.

8. The apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the one or more components in the patient's present insulin dosage regimen comprise a short-acting insulin dosage component defined by a carbohydrate ratio or a fixed meal dose, and plasma glucose correction factor.