Author: Dana Lewis

#OpenAPS rigs are shrinking in size

by Dana Lewis

My newest #OpenAPS rig is roughly the size of two sticks of Chapstick.

Small "explorer board" OpenAPS rig next to a stick of chapstick for size comparison

Think about that, especially in context of my earliest rig of a Raspberry Pi, Carelink stick, battery with enough power to last a full 12 hour day (or more), and the bulk that it added to my bag. I was happy to carry it, but once Oskar started working on a smaller rig with better range, for many people it was a game changer!

Components of an #OpenAPS implementation: pump; CGM; Raspberry Pi with battery and a radio communication device

And now we have another option with a new open source hardware board called the “915MHz Edison Explorer Board“. It’s a board designed to hold an Intel Edison (the ‘mini computer’), and it also has a 900MHz antenna on it – which means we can use it to talk to the insulin pump. This eliminates the need for a separate ‘radio stick’ – like the Carelink or a TI or similar. This is a huge improvement!

What carrying the new rig looks like:

This is what a full rig setup looks like:

  1. Insulin pump
  2. CGM
  3. Explorer Board rig
Showing the rig in size comparison with the pump

…and that’s all that’s strictly required. You can use openxshareble to read BG data from the receiver directly, but that’s currently the flakiest part of my setup, so I still recommending hotspotting your phone to pull BG data down from the cloud – and more importantly, so you can use Nightscout or similar to visualize what the loop is doing.

So, today’s post is about the new, shiny, smaller rig, and I know everyone wants to know how to get the parts to build their own!

**Update** – You can order an Explorer Board here. . Keep in mind Edison and battery are not included, so if you don’t already have an Edison, you’ll want to order one of those, too.

Improved #OpenAPS docs in the works, too!

Also, stay tuned – we have a new setup script and guide being developed and tested to streamline the setup of an OpenAPS implementation using this board or any of the previous hardware. These new docs will streamline the installation and configuration of the components required for anyone to build a new OpenAPS implementation for themselves, so they can more easily focus on testing the algorithm and decision making process that’s a critical part of DIY looping.

 

Old news alert: FDA is monitoring the DIY community

by Dana Lewis
There was a news article today that got a lot of people to react strongly. In that sense, the article did it’s job, to get people talking. But that doesn’t mean it got all the details right, as an insider to the DIY community would know.

What am I talking about?

There was an article posted today in “Clinical Endocrinology News” with the titillating headline of “FDA Official: We’re monitoring DIY artificial pancreas boom”.

Guess what, though? This is NOT news. We’ve been talking to the FDA, and they’ve in fact been “monitoring” us (especially if monitoring includes reading this blog, DIYPS.org ;)) since the summer of 2014, before we even turned our eyes toward closing the loop. Definitely since we, while they were in the room at a D-Data in 2015, announced we would close the loop. And even more so after we closed the loop and then decided to go the #OpenAPS route and find a way to make closed loop technology open source. And others from the community, like Ben West, have been talking with the FDA for even longer than we have.

What the article got right:

Recently at AADE, Courtney Lias from FDA (who gave a similar presentation at D-Data a month ago) gave a presentation talking about AP technology. She addressed both how the FDA is looking at the DIY community (they believe that they have enforcement discretion, even though no one in the DIY community is distributing a medical device, which is legally where FDA has it’s jurisdiction) and how it’s looking at the commercial vendors with products in the pipeline.

Courtney highlighted questions for CDE’s to ask patients of theirs who may be bringing up (or bringing in) DIY closed loops. They are good questions – they’re questions we also recommend people ask themselves and are a critical part of the safety-first approach the DIY community advocates every day.

(It was not mentioned in this article, but Aaron Kowalski’s presentation at AADE also highlighted some critical truths that I think are key about setting and managing expectations regarding closed looping. I often talk about these in addition to pointing out that it should be a personal, informed choice in choosing to closed loop. I hope these points about setting expectations and our points about the stages of switching from standard diabetes tool to closed looping becomes a bigger part of the conversation about closed loop safety and usability in the future.)

Where the article linked together some sentences that caused friction today:

The end of the article had a statement along the lines of an FDA concern about what happens if an AP breaks and you have a newly diagnosed person who doesn’t have old school, manual diabetes methods to fall back on. The implication appeared to be that these concerns were solely about the DIY looping “boom”. However, we know from previous presentations that Courtney/FDA usually brings this up as a concern for commercial/all AP technology – this isn’t a “concern” unique to DIY loops.

And that’s the catch – all of the concerns and questions FDA has, the DIY community has, too!

In fact, we want FDA to ask the same questions of commercial vendors, and we are going to be reaching out to the FDA to ask how they will ensure that we, as patients, can ask and get answers to these questions as end users when the FDA is approving this technology.

Because that’s the missing piece.
Right now, with the current technology on the market, we don’t get answers or insight into how these systems and devices work. This is even MORE critical when we’re talking about devices that automate insulin delivery, as the #OpenAPS community has learned from our experiences with looping. Getting the right level of data access and visibility is key to successful looping, and we expect the same from the commercial products that will be coming to market – so the FDA has a role to play here.

What we can do as a result
And we have a role, too. We’ll play our part by communicating our concerns and questions directly to the FDA, which is the only way they can officially respond or react or adjust what they’re doing. They unfortunately can’t respond to tweets. So I’m drafting an email to send to FDA, which will include a compilation of many of the questions and concerns the community has voiced today (and previously) on this topic.

Moving forward, I hope to see others do the same when concerns and questions come up. You don’t need to work for a commercial manufacturer, or be a part of a formal initiative, in order to talk to the FDA. Anyone can communicate with them! You can do that by sending an email, submitting a pre-submission, responding to draft guidances, and more. And we can all, in our informal or formal interactions, ask for clarity and push for transparency and set expectations about the features and products we want to see coming from commercial manufacturers.

Why you should post that in Gitter

by Dana Lewis

“You should post that question in Gitter.” –something @DanaMLewis says a lot

I realize it’s not always obvious to those who are newer to #WeAreNotWaiting or #OpenAPS why I am often pointing people to ask their questions in Gitter.

Let me explain:

There is a Gitter chat channel where most of the #OpenAPS and other DIY development conversations happens. (There are several other channels, so if you pop onto the main OpenAPS one, we’re happy to point you to another if there’s another one already built for another or related project.)

Gitter connects with Github, so you can use the same username to log in and ask a question. And very importantly, it’s public, so *anyone* can see the conversations in channel – even if you decide not to log in. See for yourself – click here to view the chat channel. This is very key for an open source project: anyone can jump in and check things out.

Transparency & archiving community knowledge
It also means that questions can be asked – and answered – openly, so that when someone has the same question, they can often find an existing answer with a little bit of searching.

(Tip: there’s a Gitter app for your phone, and for your desktop, both of which I use on the go – but for searching back in the channel, the web Gitter interface has a better search experience, or you can also use Google to search through the archives.)

Faster responses from a smarter, broader, worldwide community
There’s another key reason why asking a question in an open channel is helpful for Q&A. Two words: time zones. There are now (n=1)*104+ people around the world with DIY closed loops, and a lot of them pay it forward and provide guidance and also help answer questions.

If you send one individual a question in a private channel, you have to cross your fingers and hope they’re a) awake b) not working and c) otherwise available to respond.

But if you ask your question openly in a public channel, anyone out of the large community with the answer can jump in and answer more quickly. Given that we have a worldwide community and people across many time zones, this means faster answers and more “ah-ha’s” as people collaboratively work through new and already-documented-sticky-points in the build process.

So if you ask an individual a question in a private channel, you might get a “You should ask that in Gitter!” response. And this is why. :) You’re welcome as always to ping me across any channel, but often when there’s a good question, I’m going to want you to re-post in Gitter, anyway, so people can benefit from having the knowledge (including any answers from the community) archived for the next person who has the same or similar question.
4 reasons to post OpenAPS questions in Gitter

Our take on how to DIY closed loop, safely

by Dana Lewis
You will often see similar growth and evolution cycles across any type of online community, and the closed loop community is following this growth cycle as expected. Much like how Nightscout went from one very hard way to setup to get your CGM data in the cloud, to ultimately having dozens of DIY options and now more recently, multiple commercial options, closed looping is following similar trends. OpenAPS was the first open source option for people who wanted to DIY loop, and now there are a growing number of ways to build or run closed loops! And next year, there should be at least one commercial option publicly available in the U.S. followed by several more options in 2018 on the commercial market. Awesome! This is exactly the progress we were hoping to see, and facilitate happening more quickly, by making our work & encouraging others to make their work open source.

We’ve learned a lot (from building our own closed loop and watching others do so through OpenAPS) that we think is relevant to anyone who pursues DIY closed looping, regardless of the technology option they choose. This thought process and approach will likely also be relevant to those who switch to a closed loop commercial option in the future, so we wanted to document some of the thought process that may be involved.

Approaching closed looping safely

Before considering closed looping, people should know:

  • A (hybrid or even full) closed loop is not a cure. There will be a learning curve, much like switching to a pump for the first time.
  • Even after you get comfortable with a closed loop, there will still sometimes be high or low BGs, because we are still dealing with insulin that peaks in 60-90 minutes; we’ll still get kinked pump sites or pooled insulin; and we’ll still have hormones that drive our BGs up and down very rapidly in ways we can’t predict, but must react to. Closed looping helps a lot, but there’s still a lot that goes into managing diabetes.

Before using a DIY closed loop, people should consider:

  • Identifying or creating the method to visualize their data in a way they are comfortable with, both for real-time monitoring of loop activity and retrospective monitoring. This is a key component of DIY looping.
  • Running in “open loop” mode, where the system provides recommendations and you spend days or weeks analyzing and comparing those recommendations to how you would calculate and choose to take action manually.
  • Based on watching the “open loop” suggestions, decide your safety limits: you should set max basal and bolus rates, as well as max net IOB limits where relevant. Start conservative, knowing you can change them over time as you watch and validate how a particular DIY loop works with your body and your lifestyle.

Getting started with a DIY closed loop, people should think about the following:

  • Understand how it works, so you know how to fix it. Remember, by pursuing a DIY closed loop, you are responsible for it and the operation of it. No one is forcing you to do this; it’s one of many choices you can and will make with regards to how you personally choose to manage your diabetes.
  • But even more importantly, you need to understand how it works so you can choose if you need to step in and take manual action. You should understand how it works so you can validate “this is what it should be doing” and “I am getting the output and outcomes that I would expect if I were doing this decision making manually”.
  • Often, people will get frustrated by diabetes and take actions that the loop then has to compensate for. Or they’ll get lax on when they meal bolus, or not enter carbs into the system, etc. You will get much better results by putting better data into the system, and also by having a better understanding of insulin timing in your body, especially at meal times. Using techniques like “eating soon mode” will dramatically help anyone, with or without a closed loop, reduce and limit severity of meal spikes. Ditto goes for having good CGM “calibration hygiene” (h/t to Pete for this phrase) and ensuring you have thought about the ramifications of automating insulin dosing based on CGM data, and how you may or may not want to loop if you doubt your CGM data. (Like “eating soon”, ‘soaking’ a CGM sensor may yield you better first day results.)
  • Start with higher targets for the loop than you might correct to manually.
  • Move first from an “open loop” mode to a “low glucose suspend” type mode first, where max net IOB is 0 and/or max basal is set at or just above your max daily scheduled basal, so it low temps to prevent and limit lows, but does not high temp above bringing net IOB back to 0.
  • Gradually increase max net IOB above 0 (and/or increase max basal) every few days after several days without low BGs; similarly, adjust targets down 10 points for every few days gone without experiencing low BGs.
  • Test basic algorithms and adjust targets and various max rates before moving on to testing advanced features. (It will be a lot easier to troubleshoot, and learn how a new feature works, if you’re not also adjusting to closed looping in its entirety).
This is our (Dana & Scott‘s) take on things to think about before and when pursuing a closed loop option. But there’s about a hundred others running around the world with closed loops, too, so if you have input to share with people that they should consider before looping, leave a comment below! :) And if you’re looking to DIY closed loop before a commercial solution is available, you might also be interested in checking out the OpenAPS Reference Design and some FAQs related to OpenAPS.

OpenAPS poster cited in Nature!

by Dana Lewis

I was thrilled to read a commentary by John Wilbanks and Eric Topol, out in Nature today, titled “Stop the privatization of health data“. (Click here to read a PDF version of the article.)

Tucked on the bottom of the second page of the (PDF version of the) article:

“For instance, in 2014, a woman with type 1 diabetes wired together a tiny processor, an insulin pump and a continuous glucose monitor to automate the regulation of her blood sugar levels. For a small community of patients, the collective use of such ‘home-made’ systems has resulted in improvements that are well ahead of those provided by devices and interventions emerging from conventional markets.1”

(The citation is to the poster that we presented on behalf of the #OpenAPS community at the American Diabetes Association Scientific Sessions meeting last month, with self-reported outcomes from 18 of the first 40 users and builders of DIY artificial pancreas systems)

OpenAPS (n=1)*98 as of July 19, 2016It’s worth noting that there are now (n=1)*98 users of #OpenAPS, so this “small community” is growing fast: doubling approximately every three months.

Wilbanks and Topol highlight some critical truths in their commentary, and call out another (frustrating) diabetes example to illustrate:

“Although patients can monitor their glucose levels at any instant, their aggregate records are not made accessible to them. And there is no mechanism by which patients or researchers outside the company can gain access to Medtronic’s tens of thousands of measurements.”

I’ve written about this specific example before, in fact: new ‘partnerships’ mean my personal health data is likely shared with IBM for Watson’s usage…but I don’t have access to this data or insights, and am in fact missing critical information and data visualization on my FDA-approved medical device that’s been on the market for years.

The call to action for device manufacturers, regulators, and the medical industry is simple: Give me, the patient, my data that I need so I can safely take care of myself and better manage my diabetes.

Wilbanks and Topol emphasize that this won’t happen “…unless each of us takes responsibility for our own health and disease, and for the information that we can generate about ourselves. When it comes to control over our own data, health data must be where we draw the line.”

This needs to happen everywhere, not just in diabetes. Will you join us in drawing the line?

Picture this: How to do “eating soon” mode

by Dana Lewis

How do you prevent or limit meal spikes? It doesn’t take a closed loop artificial pancreas; it takes an understanding of insulin timing and the impact on your body.

I’ve written before about why getting insulin going in your body before meal carbs kick in is so important. You can read that really long post here. And I’ve written a slightly shorter post explaining how to do “eating soon mode” to achieve insulin activity peaking when you eat, without causing lows. But recently, I quickly scratched together an illustration to show the difference in the timing and outcomes between the “eating soon mode” approach compared to a traditional “pre-bolus” approach, and after receiving feedback that these images were helpful, decided to post them here.

(Again, for more context, read this post on how to calculate your eating soon amount; and this post for more of the science behind it and how we discovered this method 2+ (!) years ago. And as always, your diabetes may vary; I’m not a doctor; etc. but this is something that when applied consistently smooths out meal spikes, even when eating high fat or high protein or high carb or any kind of meal.)

What often happens with a pre-bolus of the meal insulin 15 minutes before a meal
What often happens with a pre-bolus of the meal insulin 15 minutes before a meal

 

The type of meal spike (minimal) you can achieve by getting insulin activity going 1 hour before the meal with "eating soon" mode approach
The type of meal spike (minimal) you can achieve by getting insulin activity going 1 hour before the meal with “eating soon” mode approach.

*Note – the calculation of (TargetBG-80)/ISF is assuming that you have already corrected to your normal target, i.e. 100 or 120.

Let me count the ways that the healthcare system is broken

by Dana Lewis
Alternative title to this blog post:
Choosing our battles.

I am furious: shaking with anger and frustration. Because after 13.5+ years of living with diabetes, the number one frustration continues to be fighting for access to supplies and the tools I need to treat my diabetes.

The latest scenario is this (skip to the end if you don’t want to read the emotional, nitty gritty detail part and want a tl;dr):

I changed jobs last year, and thus I had new insurance. New insurance = new authorization for all the things diabetes wise. For those of you unfamiliar, this is a long list: pump; pump supplies (reservoirs and sites); insulin; CGM receiver; CGM transmitter; CGM sensors, test strips, etc.

The biggest battle this time was for getting approval for my CGM, which I’ve been using for years. But I had to re-prove that the autoimmune disease that I have has not in fact gone away. So I did. But my CGM authorization request was denied, because my blood sugars were “too good”.

Sigh. (So maybe that’s the one “downside” to an artificial pancreas?)

I fought the denial with an appeal. Finally, after many phone calls and hoop jumping, they overturned the decision and granted approval. My CGM receiver, transmitter, and 3 months of sensors were shipped on March 15. Hooray! I figured my problems were solved until I switched insurances again in the future.

But wait, there’s more.

I waited very carefully until the end of June, past the three month mark of when I had got my first batch of sensors, to put in the order for the next 3 months worth of CGM sensors. I placed my order, went on a trip, got back to Seattle, and assumed they were floating their way to me.

Wrong.

I received a phone call today informing me that the supply company was working on the authorization for my CGM sensors..but couldn’t submit it because my doctor’s chart notes were older than 6 months. My response was, “why do you need an authorization? I had one three months ago.”

Turns out, the insurance only authorized me for CGM sensors until April 30. The order shipped as soon as authorization was received was dated March 15, so they knew there was no way I could submit another order for them before June 15.

Anyone else see the problem here? They knew I would have to go through this process AGAIN. It’s not like my non-curable type 1 diabetes was going to go away in the three months, thus my need for CGMs to help me manage said diabetes did not go away, either.

And because my endo appointment is scheduled for July 28, the supply company is unable to put in the order until I go to the appointment and get new chart notes (they have to be <6 months old). So I have to call the endo again and get a soon-as-possible appointment to pay my $15 co-pay to get new chart notes to get a new batch of sensors.

I. Am. So. Frustrated.

Tl;dr
The healthcare system is so, so broken. Patients shouldn’t be running in circles, unnecessarily going to the doctor’s office and taking up their time that could be spent helping people who need that face to face time. It’s unnecessary time for the doctor, time I have to take away from work/life, and lots of paperwork and phone calls, and it’s been this way for over a decade.
I am very fortunate, because I’m currently fighting this battle for CGM, not for test strips or insulin. (Although, I’ve done that before, too.) There are people who can’t afford CGM even if they get coverage, and people who are fighting for coverage or are in parts of the world and can’t access insulin. I very much get that and am hyper-aware of my privilege here.

But that’s why I have to choose my battles. My heat of the moment reaction is to want to rattle up the poles of my insurance company and fight to make this not the reality; but the reality is, it’s not just my insurance company. It’s every insurance company. It’s the entire healthcare system right now that’s wrong and in need of balance and fixing. And so Scott and I are trying to choose our battles – and utilize the privilege we have and the resources we have – to make the biggest difference in changing the healthcare system.

So that is what we are doing, with numerous projects related to OpenAPS and the broader #WeAreNotWaiting movement: working with the FDA and other organizations and individuals who want to help make the future of healthcare better.

But in the meantime, I’m also calling my endo to change my appointment and fighting the battle for personally getting my CGM approved and probably paying 100% out of pocket for a box or two of sensors to tide me over.

How to “soak” a new CGM sensor for better first day BGs

by Dana Lewis

Having used a CGM for years (and years and years, and years before that), and having chosen to build a DIY system that provides smart alerts and recommendations based on said CGM data (learn more about my #DIYPS system here) and ultimately using CGM data to build the open source closed loop system that automates insulin delivery (find out more about #OpenAPS here)…I’ve learned a few things about how to get the best data out of my sensors. Currently, I’m using Dexcom, so this applies to the Dexcom sensors.

The biggest thing I do to get better first day results from a continuous glucose monitor (CGM) sensor is to “soak” my sensors. Here’s what I mean by this:

Normally, you’d expect to see a person with one CGM sensor on their body, like this:

Dana Lewis_first day CGM sensor illustrationHowever, 12-24 hours before I expect my sensor to end, I insert my next sensor into my body. To protect the sensor (you don’t want the sensor filament itself to get torn off or lost in your body), I plop an old (“dead” battery) transmitter on it.

If you don’t have an old/dead transmitter, you could try taping over it – the goal is just to protect the sensor filament from ripping.

Dana Lewis_last day CGM sensor soak illustrationThe next day, when my sensor session ends:

  • I take the “live” transmitter off the old sensor, and remove the old sensor from my body. I hit “stop sensor” on my receiver, if it hasn’t already stopped itself.
  • I gently remove the “dead”/old transmitter from ‘new’ sensor.
  • I then stick the “live” transmitter onto the new sensor.
  • I hit “start sensor” on my receiver.

Dana Lewis_last day CGM sensor soak change illustrationThe outcome (for me) has always been significantly improved “first day” BG readings from the sensor. This works great when you can plan ahead and your outfits (don’t judge, sometimes you have important outfits like a wedding dress to plan around) and skin real estate support two sites on your body for 24 hours or so. This doesn’t work if you rip a sensor out by accident, so in those scenarios I go ahead and put a new sensor on, put the ‘live’ transmitter on, and hit ‘start’ to get through the 2 hour calibration period as soon as possible to get back to having live data. (All the while knowing that the first day is going to be more “meh” than it would be otherwise.)

What we heard and saw at #DData16 and #2016ADA

by Dana Lewis

As mentioned in the previous post, we had the privilege of coming to New Orleans this past weekend for two events – #DData16 and the American Diabetes Association Scientific Sessions (#2016ADA). A few things stuck out, which I wanted to highlight here.

At #DData16:

  • The focus was on artificial pancreas, and there was a great panel moderated by Howard Look with several of the AP makers. I was struck by how many of them referenced or made mention of #OpenAPS or the DIY/#WeAreNotWaiting movement, and the need for industry to collaborate with the DIY community (yes).
  • I was also floored when someone from Dexcom referenced having read one of my older blog posts that mentioned a question of why ??? was displayed to me instead of the information about what was actually going on with my sensor. It was a great reminder to me of how important it is for us to speak up and keep sharing our experiences and help device manufacturers know what we need for current and future products, the ones we use every day to help keep us alive.
  • Mark Wilson gave a PHENOMENAL presentation, using a great analogy about driving and accessing the dashboard to help people understand why people with diabetes might choose to DIY. He also talked about his experiences with #OpenAPS, and I highly recommend watching it. (Kudos to Wes for livestreaming it and making it broadly available to all – watch it here!) I’ve mentioned Mark & his DIY-ing here before, especially because one of his creations (the Urchin watchface) is one of my favorite ways to help me view my data, my way.
  • Howard DM’ed me in the middle of the day to ask if I minded going up as part of the patient panel of people with AP experiences. I wasn’t sure what the topic was, but the questions allowed us to talk about our experiences with AP (and in my case, I’ve been using a hybrid closed loop for something like 557 or so days at this point). I made several points about the need for a “plug n play” system, with modularity so I can choose the best pump, sensor, and algorithm for me – which may or may not be made all by the same company. (This is also FDA’s vision for the future, and Dr. Courtney Lias both gave a good presentation on this topic and was engaged in the event’s conversation all day!).

At #2016ADA:

  • There needs to be a patient research access program developed (not just by the American Diabetes Association for their future Scientific Sessions meetings, but at all scientific and academic conferences). Technology has enabled patients to make significant contributions to the medical and scientific fields, and cost and access are huge barriers to preventing this knowledge from scaling. At #2016ADA, “patient” is not even an option on the back of the registration form. Scott and I are privileged that we could potentially pay for this, but we don’t think we should have to pay ($410 for a day pass or $900 for a weekend pass) so much when we are not backed by industry or an academic organization of any sort. (As a side note, a big thank you to the many people who have a) engaged in discussion around this topic b) helped reach out to contacts at ADA to discuss this topic and c) asked about ways to contribute to the cost of us presenting this research this weekend.)
  • We presented research from 18 of the first 40 users of #OpenAPS. You can find the FULL CONTENT of our findings and the research poster content in this post on OpenAPS.org. We specifically posted our content online (and tweeted it out – see this thread) for a few reasons:
    • First, everything about #OpenAPS is open source. The content of our poster or any presentation is similarly open source.
    • Not everyone had time to come by the poster.
    • Not everyone has the privilege or funds to attend #2016ADA, and there’s no reason not to share this content online, especially when we will likely get more knowledge sharing as a result of doing so.
  • With the above in mind, we encouraged people stopping by to take whatever photos of our poster that they wanted, and told them about the content being posted online. (And in fact, in addition to the blog post about the poster, that information is now on the “Outcomes” page on OpenAPS.org.)
  • Frustratingly, some people were asked to take down posted photos of our poster. If anyone received such a note, please feel free to pass on my tweet that you have authorization by the authors to have taken/used the photo. This is another area (like the need to develop patient research access programs) that needs to be figured out by scientific/academic conferences – presenters/authors should be able to specifically allow sharing and dissemination of information that they are presenting.
  • Speaking of photos, I was surprised that around half a dozen clinicians (HCPs) stopped by and made mention of having used the picture of the #OpenAPS rig and the story of #OpenAPS in one of their presentations! I am thrilled this story is spreading, and being spread even by people we haven’t had direct contact with previously! (Feel free to use this photo in presentations, too, although I’d love to hear about your presentation and see a copy of it!)
  • We had many amazing conversations during the poster session on Sunday. It was scheduled for two hours (12-2pm), but we ended up being there around four hours and had hundreds of fantastic dialogues. Here were some of the most common themes of conversation:
    • Why are patients doing this?
      • Here’s my why: I originally needed louder alarms, built a smart alarm system that had predictive alerts and turned into an open loop system, and ultimately realized I could close the loop.
    • What can we learn from the people who are DIY-ing?
    • How can we further study the DIY closed loop community?
      • This is my second favorite topic, which touches on a few things – 1) the plan to do a follow up study of the larger cohort (since we now have (n=1)*84 loopers) with a full retrospective analysis of the data rather than just self-reported outcomes, as this study used; 2) ideas around doing a comparison study between one or more of the #OpenAPS algorithms and some of the commercial or academic algorithms; 3) ideas to use some of the #OpenAPS-developed tools (like a basal tuning tool that we are planning to build) in a clinical trial to help HCPs help patients adjust more quickly and easily to pump therapy.
    • What other pumps will work with this? How can there be more access to this type of DIY technology?
      • We utilize older pumps that allow us to send temp basal commands; we would love to use a more modern pump that’s able to be purchased on the market today, and had several conversations with device manufacturers about how that might be possible;  we’ll continue to have these conversations until it becomes a reality.
  • There is some great coverage coming of the poster & the #OpenAPS community, and I’ll post links here as I see them come out. For starters, Dave deBronkart did a 22 minute interview with Scott & I, which you can see here. DiabetesMine also included mention of the #OpenAPS poster in their conference roundup. And diaTribe wrote up the the poster as a “new now next”! Plus, WebMD wrote an article on #OpenAPS and the poster as well.
A picture of our #ADA2016 poster in the exhibit hall

Scott and I walked away from this weekend with energy for new collaborations (and new contacts for clinical trial and retrospective analysis partnerships) and several ideas for the next phase of studies that we want to plan in partnership with the #OpenAPS community. (We were blown away to discover that OpenAPS advanced meal assist algorithm is considered by some experts to be one of the most advanced and aggressive algorithms in existence for managing post-meal BG, and may be more advanced than anything that has yet been tested in clinical trials.) Stay tuned for more!

Research studies and usability thoughts

by Dana Lewis
It’s been a busy couple (ok, more than couple) of months since we last blogged here related to developments from #DIYPS and #OpenAPS. (For context, #DIYPS is Dana’s personal system that started as a louder alarms system and evolved into an open loop and then closed loop (background here). #OpenAPS is the open source reference design that enables anyone to build their own DIY closed loop artificial pancreas. See www.OpenAPS.org for more about that specifically.)

We’ve instead spent time spreading the word about OpenAPS in other channels (in the Wall Street Journal; on WNYC’s Only Human podcast; in a keynote at OSCON, and many other places like at the White House), further developing OpenAPS algorithms (incorporating “eating soon mode” and temporary targets in addition to building in auto-sensitivity and meal assist features), working our day jobs, traveling, and more of all of the above.

Some of the biggest improvements we’ve made to OpenAPS recently have been usability improvements. In February, someone kindly did the soldering of an Edison/Rileylink “rig” for me. This was just after I did a livestream Q&A with the TuDiabetes community, saying that I didn’t mind the size of my Raspberry Pi rig. I don’t. It works, it’s an artificial pancreas, the size doesn’t matter.

That being said… Wow! Having a small rig that clips to my pocket does wonders for being able to just run out the door and go to dinner, run an errand, go on an actual run, and more. I could do all those things before, but downsizing the rig makes it even easier, and it’s a fantastic addition to the already awesome experience of having a closed loop for the past 18 months (and >11,000 hours of looping). I’m so thankful for all of the people (Pete on Rileylink, Oscar on mmeowlink, Toby for soldering my first Edison rig for me, and many many others) who have been hard at work enabling more hardware options for OpenAPS, in addition to everyone who’s been contributing to algorithm improvements, assisting with improving the documentation, helping other people navigate the setup process, and more!

List of hardware for OpenAPS
That leads me to today. I just finished participating in a month-long usability study focused on OpenAPS users. (One of the cool parts was that several OpenAPS users contributed heavily to the design of the study, too!) We tracked every day (for up to 30 days) any time we interacted with the loop/system, and it was fascinating.

At one point, for a stretch of 3 days, we counted how many times we looked at our BGs. Between my watch, 3 phone apps/ways to view my data, the CGM receivers, Scott’s watch, the iPad by the bed, etc: dozens and dozens of glances. I wasn’t too surprised at how many times I glance/notice my BGs or what the loop is doing, but I bet other people are. Even with a closed loop, I still have diabetes and it still requires me to pay attention to it. I don’t *have* to pay attention as often as I would without a closed loop, and the outcomes are significantly better, but it’s still important to note that the human is still ultimately in control and responsible for keeping an eye on their system.

That’s one of the things I’ve been thinking about lately: the need to set expectations when a loop comes out on the commercial market and is more widely available. A closed loop is a tool, but it’s not a cure. Managing type 1 diabetes will still require a lot of work, even with a polished commercial APS: you’ll still need to deal with BG checks, CGM calibrations, site changes, dealing with sites and sensors that fall out or get ripped out…  And of course there will still be days where you’re sensitive or resistant and BGs are not perfect for whatever reason. In addition, it will take time to transition from the standard of care as we have it today (pump, CGM, but no algorithms and no connected devices) to open and/or closed loops.

This is one of the things among many that we are hoping to help the diabetes community with as a result of the many (80+ as of June 8, 2016!) users with #OpenAPS. We have learned a lot about trusting a closed loop system, about what it takes to transition, how to deal if the system you trust breaks, and how to use more data than you’re used to getting in order to improve diabetes care.

As a step to helping the healthcare provider community start thinking about some of these things, the #OpenAPS community submitted a poster that was accepted and will be presented this weekend at the 2016 American Diabetes Association Scientific Sessions meeting. This will be the first data published from the community, and it’s significant because it’s a study BY the community itself. We’re also working with other clinical research partners on various studies (in addition to the usability study, other studies to more thoroughly examine data from the community) for the future, but this study was a completely volunteer DIY effort, just like the entire OpenAPS movement has been.

Our hope is that clinicians walk away this weekend with insight into how engaged patients are and can be with their care, and a new way of having conversations with patients about the tools they are choosing to use and/or build. (And hopefully we’ll help many of them develop a deeper understanding of how artificial pancreas technology works: #OpenAPS is a great learning tool not only for patients, but also for all the physicians who have not had any patients on artificial pancreas systems yet.)

Stay tuned: the poster is embargoed until Saturday morning, but we’ll be sharing our results online beginning this weekend once the embargo lifts! (The hashtag for the conference is #2016ADA, and we’ll of course be posting via @OpenAPS and to #OpenAPS with the data and any insights coming out of the conference.)