The traditional approach to measuring blood sugar levels is to draw some actual blood from somewhere, usually your finger, deposit it on a special paper strip and then insert it into a device called a glucometer. The device then quickly presents you with the measurement.
This approach works great when you’re awake and can do it yourself. But what if you’re asleep?
I don’t want something that needs a sensor implanted under the skin since that would violate three out of my six Requirements listed in my prior post, safety being the biggest (infection risk). So what are the alternatives?
It seems that there may be a correlation between a very low blood sugar level and heart rate. I am trying to get smarter about this now (if you know anybody who could help please send them my way). But with the online research I’ve done and the diabetics I’ve spoken to a relationship does appear to exist. All I’m really looking for here is a statistically relevant correlation, not a certainty.
So I’ve set up a quick prototype of a device that will monitor my heart rate while I sleep. It includes a BUGbase + BUGvonHippel module (from my company Bug Labs). I’m also using a custom module we put together that uses a Polar radio receiver (from Sparkfun) and a Polar strap that I wear around my chest. Lastly, we wrote a simple program that runs on the BUG to log the data.
If this works, then the next step will be to modify the program to do something if certain trends in heart rate are detected. But I will save that part for another post because I want to see if this first experiment works. I will report back shortly.
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There must be a ton of data out there than can be used to test the relationship between R and blood sugar already, and if not, easily collectible. Most diabetics have those blood sugar test strips plus a device that measures heart rate (check pulse by hand, use a BP monitor, use a tread mill with a HR monitor).
Heck I could do that analysis myself. What you need to do is create a simple website that allows people to sign up and submit data. With a large amount of data you could then analyze it and test the hypothesis.
I assume that your hypothesis is that for any individual, the basal metabolic rate is a function of blood sugar, and the oxygen to support the basal metabolic rate requires a certain heart rate to supply. Is that correct?
This sounds like a neat idea. I did a quick pubmed search to see if I could find anything to help. This is the best I could come up with:
Logistic Regression Model Predicting Fasting Glucose 100 mg/dL and Scores Assigned to Each Variable
http://www.annfammed.org/cgi/content/full/6/6/555/T2
You might also want to look at:
Association of hyperglycemia with reduced heart rate variability (The Framingham Heart Study).
http://bit.ly/3UaZg
Looks like you are on to something, good luck!
Alex – thanks for the comment. My basic hypothesis is – as your blood sugar deceases it gets to a level that tells your body to “panic”, dumping adrenalin into the blood stream, thereby increasing the heart rate quickly. My hope is that there is an actual, statistically relevant correlation between glucose level and HR across the diabetic population that would make watching for that event worthy of an alert of some kind.
Thanks for the links! It’s wild. The reports seem to indicate that heart rates go down as glucose levels go up(?). Very interesting. Thanks again for taking the time to run those searches. Hopefully I’ll have more to report on shortly.
This is probably more in line with your hypothesis:
Detection of nocturnal hypoglycemic episodes (natural occurrence) in children with Type 1 diabetes using an optimal Bayesian neural network algorithm
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/search/wrapper.jsp?arnumber=4649405
So, in the general population, high heart rate is correlated with high blood sugar; however, in a diabetic population under control, high heart rate is correlated with epsiodes of low blood sugar.
Awesome find. I’ll try to get in touch with these guys. Thanks a ton Matthew!
Hey!
I am psyched to see what you are working on. I have been personally thinking a fair bit about how health care and open source can meet or work together. I’d love to start a dialogue with you about it.
My own angle has been that in the past six months, I’ve ended a crippling neck problem I used to have (bad enough that it kept me from reading / using the computer for 3 – 4 years), and found the fundamental shift was in beginning to actively do my own research. I’m now putting together a simple hardware device to monitor the curvature in my neck (the source of strain) — something I want to release under open source. The tool — useful for me now, but would’ve been extremely powerful six months ago, when I was just beginning to unravel the roots of my neck pain — points to me at a deeper question: how can technology be used to give people more control and information about their own health? Having this tool now will help me build the posture habits I’m working on; having it six months would have shown me a whole new way to play with my body that at the time I was totally, and painfully, unaware of.
I’ve been trying to think carefully about where the next useful contributions to health care will be, in terms of new technology and the open source movement. I believe that the most important work will put people in the driver’s seat when it comes to working on their own bodies. Showing people that their health is indeed hackable and understandable.
I’d love to brainstorm with you, were you interested, about ways to employ technology particularly in the direction of not just being a powerful utility, but in encouraging people to start asking (and answering) their own questions about their bodies.
Cool project!
-Nagle
Congrats on solving your neck problem. Your story is a great proof point for what I’m trying to articulate here. I think you’re right about how this direction can effect change – putting people more in control and giving them the tools to make the most of it. I’d enjoy learning more about your efforts.
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[...] Open Source Heart Monitor, Possible Blood Sugar Level Detector — another step forward in sensor networks and personal data: I’ve set up a quick prototype of a device that will monitor my heart rate while I sleep. It includes a BUGbase + BUGvonHippel module (from my company Bug Labs). I’m also using a custom module we put together that uses a Polar radio receiver (from Sparkfun) and a Polar strap that I wear around my chest. Lastly, we wrote a simple program that runs on the BUG to log the data. (via chr1a on Twitter) [...]
[...] Open Source Heart Monitor, Possible Blood Sugar Level Detector — another step forward in sensor networks and personal data: I’ve set up a quick prototype of a device that will monitor my heart rate while I sleep. It includes a BUGbase + BUGvonHippel module (from my company Bug Labs). I’m also using a custom module we put together that uses a Polar radio receiver (from Sparkfun) and a Polar strap that I wear around my chest. Lastly, we wrote a simple program that runs on the BUG to log the data. (via chr1a on Twitter) [...]