Biography

FDA Chemist, Andrea Bell-Vlasov: Making Sure Devices Used by people living with Diabetes are Safe and Effective

As a Scientific Reviewer at the U.S Food and Drug Administration (FDA), chemist Andrea K. Bell-Vlasov is playing a key role in ensuring the health and quality of life for those with diabetes.

Andrea works in the Division of Chemistry and Toxicology in the FDA’s Diabetes Diagnostic Devices Branch where she reviews the safety and effectiveness of in vitro devices (devices that are used outside the body, not implantable) and therapeutic systems that people living with Diabetes and medical professionals use to manage the disease. These devices include blood glucose meters, continuous glucose monitoring systems, and automated insulin delivery systems (formerly known as artificial pancreas systems).

Diabetes is a condition in which the body either doesn’t make enough insulin (a hormone produced by the pancreas that helps glucose, or sugar, get into our cells for energy) or can’t use its own insulin as well as it should.

Highly knowledgeable of device regulation and policies, Andrea was the lead reviewer of the first artificial pancreas to be approved in the world in 2016. She earned her Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Michigan (with a focus in electrochemistry); her Masters degree in Chemistry from the same university, and her Bachelor’s in Chemistry from the Wayne State University.

For more information please visit https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrea-bell-vlasov-521ba832