I'm a type 1 diabetic and I've been waiting for this. I'm not a big fan of watches but having a wrist mounted snippet of the email/Slack/text that I just received has been enticing, but not worth the 1 day charge time of the iWatch.
But even if the glucose testing function is somewhat above mediocre AND integrates well with a journal app of my ups and downs, I'm sold. No questions, line me up for a too-expensive band, the charging station, etc.
Are you currently using a CGM? I use the Dexcom G5 which has an iOS app and watch integration. I also have it set up to feed into a night scout instance and am working on a browser extension so I don't need to rely on the web interface so much (plus much more low key). I've found that I keep my watch on all night and really only charge it when in the shower and getting ready and it never seems to come close to dying. I literally just look at my watch and get my glucose. It's a game changer for sure.
I do have an integrated CGM but they're so goddamn itchy after the 3rd day, and they're designed to last 6 days. The cost of these things is too much to just use them for 3 days and change anyway.
If you like the ability to get notifications without having to charge often, try the Garmin VivoActive HR. You charge it once every week and receive the notifications snippet of the apps you want. Moreover it is a very programmable device with an SDK and so forth. I never used a watch before in my life, but to avoid looking at the phone so often is a great life improvement for me. The watch is also water resistant, so for instance, I can shower while there is some call I need to receive or something like that, and if I get it I just drop out: before I would not even adventure since I could not check the phone to see who was texting/calling and so forth.
Appreciate you sharing your perspective on this. Interesting to listen to the debate re: the merits of various technical approaches, but ultimately what matters is whether people will actually USE the product and derive health benefits.
I don't care at all, even if they notice I have high blood sugars and sell my info to some drug company market to me a drug claiming to lower them. The added benefit of tracking integrated in my watch trumps that.
Here's the thing about Type 1 diabetics- we'll take what we can get. No one caters to us because we're such a small subset of diabetics we may as well be a rounding error. Every treatment/study/drug you see in the media is aimed at Type 2 diabetics. Glucose meters are about the only thing we both benefit from.
In the U.K. it is very difficult to get a CGM - unless you are young or manage your Type1 very badly.
Even with doing finger prick blood tests 5 times a day, for years, I feel mostly clueless. And rely heavily on how I feel. Given how much time this condition (?) costs healthcare, this seems a poor way to manage it.
I'm desperate to learn more about my body's glucose trends. A watch that could do that would be awesome.
I suspect if you are a diabetic that actually cares about his/her blood sugar, you wouldn't give two hoots as to the company that made it easier to monitor. You would simply want the device.
Until insurances use the data to make your life miserable. Until companies buy black market database and your resume is rejected everywhere and you can't get a loan.
It's always the same with democracy. You have to make those decisions before something actually happens. After it's too late.
Are you familiar with the Helo? The Helo LX is a device already ahead of Apple's Engineers. You can find the Helo LX at http://Farmer.Helo.Life
look into who Antonio De Rosa is. In short, he is our chief designer and he was on that Apple iWatch team in 2010. We are ahead of Apple on this one. Those sensors exist today and guess who has them?! But this is great, Apple has a much bigger marketing budget than we do.
Yes and PRISM was a myth until we proved it was not.
You can't trust corporations to do the right things here. They will be tempted. Eventually one will give in.
Not only can they steal it in ways you won't notice, but they don't even need to. They can just do an update in the CLUA that people must accept or loose their 3 years of accumulated data, giving access to "anonimized health data".
The only way to be sure it's almost safe is to either:
- design en open source system so that you know it does no evil and you can control it
- avoid putting the data in the system in the first place
But even if the glucose testing function is somewhat above mediocre AND integrates well with a journal app of my ups and downs, I'm sold. No questions, line me up for a too-expensive band, the charging station, etc.