Do bad glucose levels lead to bad sleep?

Does a bad night sleep impact blood glucose levels the next day?

At the recent Quantified Self Amsterdam conference, we had a workshop on metabolism and sleep. During the workshop, we got a chance to meet and talk with type 1 diabetic patients who have been using continuous glucose monitors for years — and know deeply how sleep and glucose levels are related.

It turns out there’s so much more to glucose than just what we eat — sleep is a fundamental part of the equation.

Measuring Sleep

I’ve measured my sleep with the Fitbit and the emFit for the last year. Both are great — giving insights into sleep, and giving a history of times slept/how well we slept over time.

While the Fitbit is great for starting out looking into sleep, the emFit is a prosumer device, giving more detail with minute-by-minute heart rate, Heart Rate Variability (how well rested the body is — see below section for more) and breathing patterns. The emFit is even used for medical research and for managing chronic diseases like epilepsy.

Does Blood Glucose Impact Sleep

Some of the worst nights sleep I’ve had is when my glucose levels have gone too low during the night (hypoglycaemia).

I’m restless. I’m cold. I wake up with a headache and feeling groggy the next morning.

When blood sugar goes too low, the liver will release new glucose, but it looks like this only happens when I’m awake. In above, the levels only went back up when I woke up.

This looks like what’s called ‘rebound hyperglycemia’.

We talked about glucose levels impacting sleep during the workshop in Amsterdam. Some of the type-1 diabetics in Amsterdam would sometimes load up on carbs before bed to improve sleep.

Seth Roberts has done a lot of self-experimentation with glucose and sleep, and has tried taking honey before bed to improve sleep.

For me, I feel like I’ve slept better when glucose levels are higher.

From the data, there’s a sweet spot of blood glucose to sleep score — at around 5. If it goes lower or higher, the sleep score is worse.

Does Bad Sleep Impact Glucose Tolerance?

There’s a lot of research on how sleep deprivation can lead to insulin sensitivity.

At the QS conference, the type 1 diabetets have noticed big impacts on glucose control after little sleep. Gary Wolf also noticed in his show & tell talk.

I can’t see any patterns in my own data. This is probably because I don’t have enough nights with little sleep in the data. I haven’t been travelling much recently, no jet lag, few late nights.

I’ll update the analysis later if that changes.

Glucose and Sleep Stages

I’m seeing some big dips in glucose levels and was wondering if they’re related to sleep stages.

In above chart, glucose levels go low over a few hours, and only shoot back up again when I wake up about 4:45, when the liver kicks in and increases the glucose levels in the blood.

Fitbit recently updated their app to give sleep stages, and it’s nice. For the price, it’s one of the best on the market.

From the Fitbit chart, the drop seems to line up with a REM and deep sleep phase — starting about 03:15.

The emFit and Fitbit give similarit’s sleep stage graphs.

I’ve been looking around online, and there does seem to be some research saying that the brain uses REM sleep phases use a load of glucose.

Note about tracking sleep stages — while the Fitbit and emFit are accurate for tracking ‘time asleep’, and how restless your sleep was, they may not give accurate figures for sleep stages (REM, light and deep sleep), even if that information is in the app.

Unless a device is tracking brain waves (the Zeo Sleep Manager — now out of business used to track brain waves), it’s not possible to get an accurate measure of sleep stages.

What the emFit and Fitbit give here is just a ‘best guess’.

Glucose goes up in the morning

When I wake up in the morning, glucose levels shoot. This is probably because waking up triggers a cortisol release, which then signals to the liver to release glucose.

I get another boost when I drink a cup of coffee. Again likely due to the liver releasing more glucose.

The ‘dawn phenomenon’ is a symptom of diabetes, where glucose levels go high a few hours before waking up. It happens when cortisol triggers glucose to be released by the liver.

For me, it’s rare, only when my glucose levels go too low overnight.

High Glucose Makes me sleep after lunch

Something I noticed recently. The bigger the post-lunch glucose spike, the bigger the crash I feel when the glucose levels come down.

The combination of no activity after a high carb meal spike my blood glucose the most.

Glucose and Heart Rate Variability

Heart Rate Variability(HRV) is a measure of how stressed the body is.

HRV is lower When we’re tired after a gym session, when we’re sick or when we’re stressed HRV is lower. When we’ve recovered well, HRV will be up (more on HRV here.)

Measuring the difference between the evening HRV and morning HRV gets a good indication of how well recovered during our sleep. emFit gives this value.

From the data, low blood glucose overnight impacts HRV recovery. Again some of the worst nights HRV values have been at the same time as low glucose levels.

What did I learn?

· Hypoglycemia is very bad for sleep. Maintaining stable glucose levels during the day is important.

· Too much glucose is also not good. Getting it into a stable range is most important.

· There’s a strong signal between HRV values and glucose levels.

· For me, bad sleep doesn’t seem to impact my glucose control. However — this is likely more related to lack of data. This is something I will investigate further.

Having hypoglycemia stages during the night is worrying. It’s a symptom of diabetes, so it’s something I need to take seriously.

Getting this data has changed my behaviour. I’m no longer skipping meals, intermittent fasting. From the data, it hurts my sleep quality. I might revisit later when I know more, however.

But most of all, drawing conclusions here is hard. There are so many factors going on. Six weeks of data is not nearly enough to draw anything conclusive. But it does give us useful information.

Where Next?

Lots more research. Figure out what other factors are involved in sleep. There’s so many glucose metabolism processes going on here. Likely I’ve only touched the surface and I’m missing big parts of the picture.

More analysis on the data. These devices produce so much data. I’ve only just scratched the surface in the analysis. Sleep stages and movement overnight looks really interesting.

I’m also reading Mark Hyman’s excellent book ‘Blood Sugar Solution’ is giving me great ideas on how to get my glucose levels under control, and it’s giving me some great info on where to go next.

Blog Post Series

This post is the second in a series of blog post where I’m digging in deep into how glucose is impacting my life.

1. First four weeks of continuous glucose monitoring.
2. Glucose and sleep.
3. Glucose and activity.
4. Glucose and food.
5. Glucose and stress.
6. Lowering my HBA1C

Links

• Hypoglycemia and diabetes
• How sleep deprivation can impact glucose control.
• Gluconeogenesis
• Mark Hyman’s Blood Sugar Solution.
• Seth Roberts on improving sleep with honey.
• Tim Ferriss’s blog on improving sleep.
• Dave Asprey on biohacking sleep.

Can get in Ireland without a prescription — although that’ll probably change soon…

Really looking forward to hearing about nob-invasive monitor! Is it something your involved in yourself?

Oh, and love your work! Follower of your channels for a while now ☺

I’ve been using the Abbot Labs Continuous Glucose Monitor for the last four weeks, I’ve seen some massive insights into my lifestyle and overall wellness.

How glucose levels throughout the day compared to activity, heart rate. Whether I’m sitting or moving after a meal. How my body reacts to glucose when I’m sleeping, or when I lack sleep.

What it does when I’m stressed was incredible.

But also, how type 2 diabetes could come about, how maybe it could even be detected years before any official diagnosis.

Using the Glucose Monitor

The monitor comes with a reader and a sensor. The sensor is NFC-powered. It can read through clothes.

The sensor has a needle that goes under the skin, but I don’t even feel it going on.

Sometimes when I roll over on my arm at night, I might feel it, but in general, I don’t even notice it.

Looking at the Data

The device itself gives daily graphs, which are useful. But connecting with a computer and you can get a much better picture of what’s going on.

The default software you get with the Freestyle is not bad. It shows daily trends, individual day charts,

With this, you get averages over the day. Even an estimated HBA1C value that’s accurate (a recent test had it as 34 / 5.3%).

HBA1C levels above 5.7% are considered high-risk for diabetes — Self Hacked goes into it in great detail here.

I haven’t yet been able to export the data directly from the FreeStyle Libre software. But connecting to the third party app Diasend, I could upload and export as a spreadsheet.

Glucose and Meals

This was a huge surprise for me, with some huge spikes in glucose levels after meals.

It wasn’t just the obvious hitting my glucose levels hard — high-carb foods. It was rice (brown and white), sweet potatoes, gluten free bread.

Functional medicine doctor Chris Kresser talks a good deal about insulin insensitivity, and how post-meal levels above 7.8 are getting into dangerous territory.

Glucose and Activity

Walking after a meal stables levels while I’m walking.

Standing desks also help.

I’m getting some of my worst spikes if I’m sitting down after a high-carb meal.

Glucose and Stress

My worst data point by far is when I’ve been most stressed — giving a talk at the Quantified Self Europe conference.

Comparing to Fitbit Heart Rate data. Glucose spikes about 30 minutes after the spike in heart rate.

Sleep impacting glucose control?

I can’t see clear patterns in the data on this yet. I probably don’t have enough clear data points.

Morning Heart Rate Variability measured in the emFit app has an impact. I’m seeing better blood glucose control on days with higher HRV values.

Glucose Impacting Sleep Quality?

When my glucose is low, my sleep is pretty bad. I feel tired after the night, and there are lots of interruptions.

From the emFit, HRV goes down — basically saying I’ve had negative recovery over the night.

Conclusions

From only a few weeks of using the continuous glucose monitor, there are worrying trends in the data — many signs of insulin insensitivity.

But there are also positive signs.

I can see it’s possible to keep blood sugar under control — watching what I eat, sleep well and looking after stress.

Experts in the field say the same thing. Dr. Mark Hyman, a functional medicine doctor, and author talks about insulin sensitivity being reversible.

Diabetes and pre-diabetes ARE reversible by aggressively changing lifestyle, nutritional support, and occasionally medications. — Mark Hyman

Glucose monitors can be a part of that.

I can track how my average glucose and HBA1C levels change over time.

And it holds me accountable. Numbers don’t lie. I can’t fool myself that eating the snacks after lunch is OK.

And I can figure out the small lifestyle adjustments bring the biggest return. What foods are worst for me and what activity works best?

Next Steps

Can I lower my HbA1C levels over the course of the next three months? Measured through the CGM and blood tests. And will lower glucose levels impact any other biomarkers — like cholesterol?

Links

• The Freestyle Libre device.
• The emFit Sleep monitor.
• Dr. Mark Hyman talks about how to reverse diabetes.
• Podcast on The Quantified Body where Tim Omer talks about Continuous Glucose Monitoring.
• Jason Fung is another doctor in the space talking about how to reverse type 2 diabetes.
• Self Hacked has a series of articles about HBA1C and how to better manage it.

If we have a wearable fitness device that already that tracks sleep, why do we need a dedicated sleep tracker?

A year ago I had to think long & hard to get a dedicated sleep tracker when I already had a wearable that tracked sleep.

I’m very glad I did.

The Beddit, a dedicated, contactless sleep sensor just brings a whole new level of insights to my sleep.

What we Measure, We Improve

While my sleep hasn’t been bad, there’s always room for improvement. A better understanding of how I slept is the first step.

A good sleep sensor should be easy to use and give us enough information to show how we slept.

A good sleep sensor should also be able to trigger insights on how I can improve my sleep. For me, bad sleep was nearly always related to lifestyle. Staying up late surfing social media, eating late or if the room was too hot.

Beddit Functionality

At the core of the Beddit UI is the ‘sleep score’. The sleep score takes into account quality & quantity. Quality here means overnight movement, wake time and snoring among other factors.

I can also quickly see in the UI:

• Sleep quality over the night
• Sleep quality for the last week
• Overnight heart rate
• Tips on how to improve sleep

Main screen — overalls sleep score & times. The last seven nights sleep history on the top.

Sleep Performance Overnight — we want deeper sleep for a better nights sleep.

Heart Rate over the course of the night

Beddit helps me improve my sleep

The Beddit sleep score & sleep history over the last seven days are useful for gauging where I am now with my sleep. The sleep tips can sometimes be helpful.

But I’ve gotten the most benefit from the insights Beddit triggers.

What improves and what harms my sleep

With the newly added ‘tagging’ feature in Beddit, the app builds a picture of what impacts my sleep.

For me, eating late at night and alcohol are the biggest. Tuesday as well. Maybe from the change of sleep schedule from the weekend?

Note — from December 2016 this is only available on iOS.

Beddit keeps me accountable

Seeing my weekly sleep stats every time I set the alarm is a shows me clearly when I’m running sleep debt over many days.

Beddit brings sleep coaching

Beddit connects with my Physicians Electronic Health Record (EHR) network so that I can get my sleep data to my doctor. I can even get dedicated sleep coaches to look into two-week reports. For someone suffering from a sleep disorder like sleep apnea, this could be a life changer.

Digging in Deep

Beddit’s accuracy

The sensor in the Beddit (ballistocardiography) is the best type of sleep sensor available short of measuring brain waves through an EEG device (like the Zeo).

Many studies have been done using the Beddit & comparing it with the gold standard in sleep tracking, Polysomnography. Beddit comes in pretty good at 99% — much better than any wrist sleep tracking device.

Note, the Beddit is used in many clinical studies around the world.

Accessing the Raw Data

Beddit has a feature to download raw data to a spreadsheet, which can be very useful for doing any detailed analysis. It even gives more advanced metrics like overnight Heart Rate Variability (HRV).

Beddit also has an API to access data, but currently only available for companies or research teams.

The Good

The UI

First thing in the morning while turning off my alarm I need a device that’s easy to use. Fortunately, the Beddit UI has that. The sleep score is clear. Scrolling down and its easy to the heart rate & sleep depth graphs.

Accuracy

At 99% accuracy, I’m much more confident in the sleep graphs the Beddit gives than any wrist tracking devices.

Very Active Development

The Beddit team are regularly updating the app with new features — over the last six months are tagging and trends. The Beddit 3.0 hardware upgrade has just come out with temperature & humidity monitoring. These feature rollouts will no doubt continue.

Where is Beddit lets down?

Android Users Behind the Curve in Feature

Automatic sleep tracking has been on the iPhone for over a year now but still no word on this being rolled out to Android. (Note, there are limitations in the Android platform behind this, so this might take some time still).

Not so Smart Alarm?

Alarms waking us while we’re in a deep sleep can ruin our mornings.

Smart sleep alarms work by triggering the alarm during the light sleep stages. It does this by triggering in a time window instead of at the alarm time.

The Beddit smart alarm does do this, but it has drawbacks. I want to maximise the amount of time in bed. In my experience, the Beddit can trigger up to 30 minutes before the alarm time.

Other devices like the ResMed S+ maximise time in bed by only triggering if it senses I’m slipping back into deep sleep, giving me the extra time. Getting this in the Beddit would be fantastic.

Data Loss?

A few times when leaving the bed in the middle of the night, no sleep was registered after.

I’ve talked with the Beddit guys about this, and it looks like there’s a problem with my environment. They have seen this before, but it’s not common.

Sleep Score?

The sleep scores don’t always match to how I feel for me. There have been times where I’ve been lying awake for hours overnight, but the sleep score or graphs don’t pick it up.

I appreciate home sleep sensors are still a young technology and giving a ‘score’ for a nights sleep that applies to everyone is not easy.

Sleep Tips

The sleep tips Beddit give are limited. Other devices like the JawBone UP3 do sleep tips well, so it was a let down to see this in the Beddit.

Beddit could give much more relevant tips with the data they’re collecting.

If I was new to sleep tracking, sleep tips would likely be the most useful feature.

How does Beddit comparing to other trackers

Beddit is in the middle ground between high-end sensors and fitness trackers, so it occupies a great sweet spot there.

Wrist Based Sensors

Just because of the limitations of wrist-based devices, it’s impossible to get the same quality of data compared to the Beddit. The apps might say they’re tracking REM, light & deep sleep but these are just best guesses in reality.

Having said that, the apps with other trackers like the UP3 have a lot of additional functionality that Beddit doesn’t yet have. The bedtime notifications in the UP3 app are great. Sleep tips also in the UP3 are much better.

High End Sensors

Compared to high-end sensors on the market (Emfit QS, ResMed S+), the Beddit stands up well.

The depth of information & data accuracy may not be the same. But there are very few who would need that data.

The Beddit is fantastic value for money for what you get with the Beddit.

Beddit 3.0

The Beddit 3.0, just out late 2016, takes everything in the Beddit 2.0 & adds new features, including temperature & humidity monitoring. More data will mean better sleep insights.

Note — many of the new features in Beddit 3.0 are not yet currently out on the Android app, but due early 2017.

Conclusions

For so long, sleep has been a mystical beast for me. I didn’t know why I wasn’t sleeping well some nights, so I assumed it was out of my control.

Beddit allows me to understand my sleep. I can see clearly that my lifestyle impacts my sleep.

Any issues I have with the Beddit are minor issues compared to the power of what Beddit gives me.

Beddit is for anyone who wants to improve their sleep — which is most people.

Beddit Blog

Beddit has a great blog, where they discuss everything from how the devices have helped people diagnose sleep apnea to training for a marathon.

Just a note — resting heart rate is hugely determined by other factors. Alcohol is a massive one, as anyone whos seen their resting heart rate increase after a night out.

One other potential reason for the decrease here could be people taking a dry January?

Osteopenia is low bone density, not full blown osteoporosis.

In 2015 it had gotten worse, just on the borderline to osteoporosis when I got a follow-up scan.

Getting this diagnosis so young was a wakeup call. I already knew I was unhealthy, overweight, and had some long-term health issues. This was what led me down the route of self-tracking and moving over to a healthier lifestyle.

Standard Western Approach to Osteoporosis

When diagnosed I got routine follow up questions & tests. Was I eating enough dairy (I wasn’t, I’m lactose intolerant)? Am I getting enough exercise?

They do blood tests — calcium, thyroid, vitamin D, testosterone. All came out OK.

Their recommendations — eat dairy come back when I’m 50.

Was my osteoporosis lifestyle realted?

Overall I wasn’t healthy. I wasn’t living a healthy lifestyle, eating a healthy diet, getting enough exercise.

Maybe osteoporosis was just one symptom of many other health problems I’d been having. If I tackled those problems, then maybe the osteoporosis would resolve itself? Or at least not get any worse?

Gut problems causing Osteoporosis?

Most of my life I’ve suffered from Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS).

For healthy bones, we need a load of different nutrients, not just calcium. They need vitamin D, vitamin K2, magnesium, phosphorous.

Mostly these are absorbed in the large intestine (bowel).

If the bowel is inflamed, it’s not going to absorb these nutrients.

Healing gut issues

My gut issues were all bad diet related.

No more junk food. Removing processed foods, sticking with Paleo principles — no gluten, no dairy, no fast-carb foods.

Mark Hyman’s books were a great starting point. I’ve been mainly on the paleo diet since.

I’ve tried other things also along the way — bone broth, giving up alcohol. Meal replacement drinks don’t work.

Once we stop putting junk into our systems, the body naturally starts to heal.

Bone health related to the microbiome?

So much new science coming out almost every day on the microbiome — the latest saying it has a big part in:

• Blood sugar regulation
• Controlling our appetite
• Controlling our mood

Could it be responsible for bone health?

There’s some research showing there’s a strong relation between the microbiome and bone health — Chris Kresser has written about it.

The reasons behind it:

• Immune system triggered by bad bacteria in the gut impacts bone re-growth.
• Unhealthy microbiome was reducing nutrient absorption.
• Germ-free mice show bone growth impacted.

With the IBS and bad diet, and taking way too many antibiotics over my life my microbiome was in pretty bad condition.

uBiome confirmed — I was low on two types of good bacteria.

I’ve been on high strength probiotics and more fibre since, but I need to do a follow-up test to see what changes have happened.

Healthy Liver = healthy bones?

Any blood test I’ve ever done in my life showed I had high levels of bilirubin — a liver biomarker.

Bilirubin is old red blood cells. It’s taken out of the blood by the liver and dumped out for the body through the bile. High levels can eventually lead to jaundice.

Doctors diagnosed it as being ‘Gilberts Syndrome’, a genetic syndrome. They said, and there was nothing that could do, but also it was nothing to worry about.

Since the osteoporosis diagnosis, I looked in deeper for any connection.

The latest research is saying there is a connection between the high level of bilirubin and bone health:

• Patients with liver disease are much more likely to have osteoporosis.
• Bilirubin is toxic to bone regrowth.

High bilirubin levels are also related to the microbiome. Bilirubin is broken down by good gut bacteria in healthy microbiomes. Bilirubin is reabsorbed into the blood stream if it’s not broken down.

What I tried:

• No more alcohol. There’s medical advice saying people with Gilbert’s syndrome shouldn’t drink alcohol.
• Cleaning up the diet — less sugar & processed food feeding the bad bacteria and more fibre to feed the good bacteria.
• Probiotics — good gut bacteria break down bilirubin.
• In the last 12 months there’s been a dramatic drop in my bilirubin levels:

Above are blood tests with the company Thriva.

Exercise and bone health

Bones, just like muscle — they get stronger with exercise.

I’ve always done some exercise, but maybe not the best kind for bone health. So jogging and weight lifting are going to work better than cycling and swimming.

More exercise is a work in progress.

Where to go from here?

So much information out on the web on alternative approaches. Other approaches I’m investigating are:

· High-Intensity Interval Training — lots of

· Improving low stomach acid — helps with nutrient absorption.

And of course, there is new science coming out in medicine in areas like the microbiome. Even vitamin K2 was relatively unknown until recently. There are new discoveries on the microbiome every other week.

Continuing research is key.

Conclusions

The more I dig into osteoporosis, what can cause it, what can help rebuild it, it’s clear that there’s so much more going on that simple calcium intake.

For me, a big part of the reason I have osteoporosis is from an unhealthy lifestyle. Sure, maybe there are many things out of my control, with Gilbert’s syndrome and having taken too many antibiotics as a kid.

But — there’s a load of stuff I can do right now tackle this.

I haven’t had a DXA scan since 2015 so I don’t know directly how it’s impacted by the changes. And even if it doesn’t work, I’ll still be healthier, fitter and have my IBS under control. Not bad side-effects.

References

IBS and osteoporosis

• Osteoporosis and Gastrointestinal Disease

Microbiome and osteoporosis:

• How Your Gut Affects Your Bones
• The Microbiota and Bone Health: Yet Another Reason to Protect Your Gut — Chris Kresser

Bilirubin and osteoporosis:

• Bile And Its Role In Bone Health
• Bone Mineral Densities in Individuals with Gilbert’s Syndrome: A Cross-Sectional, Case-Control Pilot Study

Our healthcare systems are under enormous strain right now.

Populations are ageing. More and more people are suffering from chronic diseases.

Experts estimate over 600 million people worldwide will have type-2 diabetes by 2025.

Will there be enough doctors? How will we pay for it?

At the Health2.0 conference in Barcelona, May 2017 and over 120 companies and over 600 attendees from around the world came to Barcelona to share what’s going on in the fields of Digital Health and Health2.0.

What is Health2.0?

Health2.0 is using the latest digital technologies to improve the overall health service.

It can include:

• More and better data — the more data, the better and faster the diagnosis.
• Home monitoring — flag potential health problems.
• Artificial Intelligence make sense of all this data.
• Better connectivity — Consultations over video or instant messenger.

Digital Therapeutics is all about reducing the use of pills and surgery. It can do that with better monitoring, better and more relevant information or personal coaching lifestyle changes.

Quantifiedself vs modifiedself .. how digital therapeutics can help! #health2eu #hcsmeufr #hcsm

 — @LionelREICHARDT

Health2.0 Means Using Data Better

Have you ever gone to the hospital and been surprised that they had to ring your GP to get your medical history?

In the 21st century, where we can access our emails or photos anywhere in the world — health data is still lagging far behind.

Of course, there are reasons — privacy concerns the biggest one — but nothing we can’t work around.

In Barcelona, HealthCoin talked about storing all these health records in the cloud securely. Only those with permissions have access to them, so GPs and hospitals over insurance companies and employers.

HealthCoin doesn’t just store your health data. It can store your entire families health history. Medical data can be passed on to future generations. Having accurate intergenerational data is huge for disease diagnosis, and something that’s just not possible right now.

healthcoin at @Health2eu creating user owned data asset that can be passed on to future generations #digitalhealth #blockchain @dvespinosa

 — @justin_d_lawler

Technically the data is stored using BlockChain to enable access.

HeathTech means better relationships with patients

“We are now approaching the point at which the power of the computer can be harnessed effectively to relieve the burden on clinicians and leave them more time for patient care” — Kenneth Baker, UK Secretary for Business, 1984

HealthTech has promised so much over the last 30 years but hasn’t delivered.

We still only get 10 minutes with the doctor. Doctors still need to spend significant time on routine tasks like paperwork and analysing blood reports.

Artificial Intelligence has the potential to automate much of this.

Less overhead on the doctor means more time to spend with patients.

Aidence presented their solution to automate reviewing of lung scans using Artificial Intelligence. Results are faster, more accurate and cheaper scans.

Aidence is working on bringing the same AI technology to other areas.

HealthTech means more Empowered Patients

Treatment is no longer just about clinicians providing healthcare. Patients are getting actively engaged in their health. Technology is enabling this.

@perkiz @mjseres @pascal_lardier @thacherT1D discussing how pioneering patients drive change #health2eu

 — @SXTHealthCIC

People are creating companies in the space of enabling patients.

Medivizor is a company that give patients personalised and up-to-date information on their condition.

The company Antidote connects patients with ongoing medical trials for their condition.

Antidote are already saving lives. Speakers from Antidote talked about how terminal cancer patients have already used their service to connect with medical trials, leading successful treatment.

Patient turned Entrepreneur in HealthTech

Entrepreneurship is all about creating solutions to real problems.

Those most impacted by health conditions are patients, so patients are the best people to come up with solutions.

Michael Seres, who for years suffered from ulcerative colitis, leading to having a colostomy bag fitted. Michael talked about how unusable solutions given to him by his healthcare provider at the time. Michael went on to developing his system and setting up the company 11 Health.

Patient turned #entrepreneur @mjseres at the opening keynote #health2eu

 — @dhealthtoday

Sophie Thatcher, who has type 1 diabetes, took her condition into her hands and created an ‘artificial pancreas’ to better manage her condition. Using open source software, a continuous glucose monitor and an insulin pump, treating her diabetes are now much more automated.

What Next in HealthTech?

Chronic diseases have the potential to cripple our current healthcare systems.

Insurers are pushing more for outcome dependent healthcare over just paying for pills and procedures. They want better results for lower costs. Sometimes those results come from lifestyle changes or even simply better monitoring.

The changes happening in healthcare right now are coming from innovative patients solving problems they have to face daily in the management of their conditions. It’s from better human connectivity.

And it’s from using what we have already — data — in better ways.

Links

• Barcelona Health2.0 conference.
• Health20 Conference worldwide.
• Article on how HealthCoin is revolutionising the treatment of diabetes.
• You can see Sophie talking about her artificial pancreas at a Stanford MedicineX talk.

Healthcare in 2017 is not sustainable.

The costs of treating chronic diseases and an ageing population are putting massive strains on our healthcare systems worldwide.

It’s not just problems with our health. There are fundamental problems with the healthcare service itself. Human error is the third leading cause of death in the US. Only heart disease and cancer are more deadly.

At the Dublin Tech Summit HealthTech stage, we got to hear about the latest innovations in healthcare — now and coming soon.

HealthTech can solve so many problems in healthcare

eHeath Ireland was running the HealthTech stage during the day and talked about projects being run in Ireland now, including a genomic sequencing project for epilepsy for faster and better diagnosis.

Digital Hospitals are an initiative coming out of Finland that’s improving overall care and reducing time spent in the hospital. Patients are sent home with continuous monitoring wearable sensors once treated in the hospital.

Home care means reduced costs and better patient outcomes. Home care is far less stressful. Patients are no longer waiting in hospital beds, not getting any sleep. They’re in environments they know and can relax in.

Wearable and portable sensors will also be huge in the wider health market.

Take the MedWand for instance.

The MedWand allows doctors to remotely diagnose and monitor patients from anywhere in the world

- in rural areas; patients with house bound illnesses. Even just to remove the time overhead of doctor waiting rooms.

Other devices discussed were Tytocare, similar to the MedWand and already in use in the US, and AliveCor, a portable heart sensor powered by the iPhone. AliveCor claims it’s possible to prevent 90% of strokes with regular monitoring.

Data Analytics and Machine Learning is huge

We’re already swimming in a sea of data, and this is only going to get bigger.

There’s a coming explosion of data coming from patients. From blood testing to wearable sensor data to full DNA records.

With large data sets, we can look for patterns in the data. We can detect illnesses long before symptoms become obvious.

Using data analytics to uncover the needle in the haystack in #healthcare #dublintechsummit @RobertWahMD #PrecisionMedicine #bigdata

 — @justin_d_lawler

Data is incredibly valuable. Researchers are not getting enough of it. Speakers from the company Have a Heart for Health collect data donations from iPhone sensors. With that data, they’re generating apps to help with predicting heart disease. In the US alone there are an estimated one million people who have undiagnosed heart disease — this app is aiming to help these people.

It’s not just sensor data. Search teams are diagnosing diseases from people’s search history:

Predicting lung cancer from web search logs - https://t.co/hUOHT6P3Hs #dublintechsummit #microsoft #health #health20

 — @justin_d_lawler

Speakers were very keen to point out that Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence will not replace humans. They will augment humans.

Machine Learning leads to less human errors and faster diagnosis.

Smartphones and smart watches as are doctors

Teams are building apps that can predict epileptic seizures before they happen.

Wearables are predicting illnesses 2–3 days before any symptoms in test teams.

HealthTech will detect chronic diseases early

With many chronic diseases like diabetes, the earlier it’s detected the better.

Wize Mirror is a device in development that will scan the users face every morning, looking for signs of diabetes among other chronic diseases like stress and heart disease.

Some of the other trends in Health Tech

The top three from the summit to look out for are:

• Augmented Reality — Training new doctors. Diagnosing disease. In the operating room.
• Drones — delivering prescriptions to your door.
• Music Therapy — HealthTunes has music to help with conditions from pain management to Parkinson’s to neonatal intensive care.

What are the blockers for greater HealthTech takeup?

In a word — trust.

Patients confidentiality must be respected — whether it’s medical staff or MedTech companies.

In a world where a patient’s health records are far more valuable to cyber criminals than credit cards (criminals are using health information as identification, and unlike credit card information, health information can’t be ‘cancelled’).

Value of #health info 50-100x more valuable to cyber thieves than credit card @RobertWahMD #security #blockchain #dublintechsummit

 — @justin_d_lawler

But security is being taken very seriously, with technologies like BlockChain and customers controlling what data they share.

Conclusions

With technology advancing at such a rapid pace, bringing so many innovations over the coming months and years — one thing for sure is that healthcare will look radically different in the future than it does now. And this can only be for good.

Links

• Human error third leading cause of death in the US.
• Genomic sequencing of epilepsy in Ireland.
• Wearables are detecting when we’re just about to fall ill.
• Digital Hospitals in Finland.
• The explosion of data coming from the latest in blood testing.
• Wize Mirror monitors for signs of disease.
• BlockChain in healthcare.
• Microsoft detecting lung cancer from search logs.