Nipro Amigo Insulin Pump Review

Discontinued: This pump is no longer available in the United States.

The Nipro Amigo Insulin Pump is a true labor of love for the company. During our review we spoke with the company several times and the enthusiasm for the insulin pump really showed through. Let’s take a look at the pump review to see if the product lives up to the praise.

If you’re going to spend over $5,000 on a product and trust your life to it, you should know something about the company. Nipro Diabetes is a division of Nipro Corporation, a large Japanese medical device and supply company. Nipro Corporation has been in business for over 50 years and manufacturers its own products as well as supports other large medical product companies.

Nipro Diabetes is located in Miramar, Florida where it also manufacturers the Amigo. The worldwide distribution of the Amigo is primarily handled in the Florida facility. While Nipro Diabetes does sell other third party diabetes related products (test strips, glucose meters, etc.), its main business is insulin pump development, manufacturing and sales.

KEY ADVANTAGES

• EASE OF PROGRAMMING: Large icon driven programming is very helpful. Also, the device has an audio component that guides the set up.
• LARGE BASAL RANGE: The basal range stretches to 30U/hr. This allows for maximum insulin delivery options.
• HIGH BASAL RATE: Up to 48 rates available per profile (4 profiles available). What does this mean? You can have four different profiles (e.g., exercise, normal, sick, etc.) and within each profile you can set the basal insulin delivery up to 48 rates. It allows you maximum flexibility for insulin delivery.
• DURABILITY: Shatter and water resistant case.

KEY DISADVANTAGES

• WEIGHT AND LOSS: The pump is a little larger and heavier than many of the competitors.
• WEBSITE: Maybe it was us, but we found the website to be rather cumbersome. It was difficult to find the manuals and certain information about the products. Additionally, some aspects were done in audio, others in text. However, if you did not want to listen to the audio, there was no other way the information was presented. Eventually we were able to find the information we were looking for, but it took a little more work that we would have liked.
• DATA MANAGEMENT: There is no option to download your data from the device. This makes it difficult to keep track of your insulin therapy.

INFUSION SET

The Amigo only uses UnoMedical Comfort Infusion Sets. The price on these can vary widely and seem especially pricey on the Nipro website.

BOTTOM LINE

The Amigo insulin pump is a good option. It has a wide range of settings and options for users. The manual had great pictures that illustrated how to use the device. The text was easy to read and follow.

We did not like the website access or the lack of data management features. However, the customer service department is staffed 24/7 by diabetes educators.

So, if you can’t find the answer on their site, you can easily get knowledgeable support. The company also will send someone to your home for training if you need help learning how to run the insulin pump.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATION