Forum 2025 Insights: access more keynotes, articles, and expert discussions from our annual event.
Virtual care and innovative technologies continue to transform how we support people with diabetes
Sarah Lytton, MS, RDN, LDN, SVP, Director Clinical Strategy, Lockton Companies
Erica Phelps, RD, Health & Wellbeing Specialist, Shape Corp
Christopher Regal, MS, Director, Clinical Innovation, AHIP
Calvin Wu, MD, Director, Clinical Strategy, Teladoc Health
Nabomita Dutta, Chief Strategy & Partnership Officer, Teladoc Health (Moderator)
Digital diabetes management programs have been in the market for more than a decade. They’ve evolved from app-based blood sugar tracking to a more holistic, patient-centered approach. Innovation and technology have driven change in diabetes management, but prevalence in the U.S. remains high.
How can diabetes care leverage virtual care to take the next step? At Forum 2025, leaders from organizations across healthcare shared insights on how it’s informing the strategies of the future.
Technological advancements, such as continuous glucose monitors (CGMs), medications and more create opportunities for better diabetes control, but population-level health outcomes have remained the same.
The lack of access to endocrinologists and the fact that many people with diabetes are undiagnosed contribute, but Dr. Calvin Wu emphasizes core principles of better health. “What’s important to meaningfully control blood sugars hasn’t changed,” he said. “It’s still the foundations of nutrition, physical activity, sleep, managing stress and mental health.”
These foundational behaviors go beyond diabetes and are critical to a patient-centered program. “It’s understanding that even before a diagnosis, the impact lifestyle can have,” Sarah Lytton said. “We have a long way to go to build the basic principles of healthy habits.”
As part of a personalized, comprehensive care plan, lifestyle changes and innovative technologies are key to making the biggest impact, Chris Regal said. “We can create that holistic, wraparound support,” he said. “When possible, we should go upstream and better identify people who are starting down the path of diabetes and have increased risk factors.”
Given the prevalence of diabetes and people at risk for diabetes, plan sponsors are counting on programs that can scale to meet the needs of a lot of people with their own unique barriers. “Teladoc Health leveled the playing field,” Erica Phelps said of the benefits to Shape Corp. “It was accessible to everyone we insured, regardless of where they lived.”
Accessibility can be especially important for diabetes care, considering the outsized impact it has on subsets of the population. Many communities don’t have diabetes self-management education and support services or diabetes prevention programs, making virtual care critical to bridging the gap, Dr. Wu said.
Still, programs must be able to adapt to meet the personal needs of each person. “The reality is the relative impact of lifestyle change differs with each person,” Dr. Wu said. “Programs have to be able to tailor to be effective.”
According to Lytton, this is where the responsible use of AI can contribute to the success of a diabetes program. She said AI can play a role with personalized, predictive communications that support meaningful behavior change and help people interpret rich data sets from CGMs or other wearables.
Diabetes care is a space for the best of technology, as well as human-based care. Lytton said she wants to find a way for the two to work more closely together. “Instead of digital health programs being used as a support tool,” she said, “I’d love to see it be part of the core care delivery model.”
When Phelps joined Shape Corp., she said the mentality with diabetes management and similar programs was that these programs would run themselves. “You have to build trust with these solutions,” Phelps said.
She said both patients and plan sponsors benefit when a diabetes program can establish trust. For Shape Corp. employees, cost is often a barrier to managing diabetes. “If we can provide them the meter and other things, we’ve provided value to them,” Phelps said. “These members now trust us more. They know we care about them and their family. We’re building that relationship and helping them believe they can make those changes.”
Regal said health plans are also looking at value in many ways. ROI may not always be the only measure of value, but plan sponsors want to know: What are the clinical and financial impacts of virtual diabetes management solutions?
In 2025, Lockton analyzed two years of Teladoc Health diabetes management program data. Participants had better adherence to care, fewer short-term diabetes-related complications and lower hospital utilization related to their diabetes. The result was a 2.4% reduction in total medical and pharmacy costs for participants vs. non-participants. “
For me, it goes back to: How do we drive better engagement? Because it works,” Lytton said.
