Back in 2014 I bought myself a Fitbit Charge HR. The goal was to gather Health data in order to combine it with data extracted from my insulin pump and meter. This way I aim to get a full picture of my health and pinpoint possible improvements. It sounds easy but the difficulty lies in distinguishing causes from consequences.

After 3 years  building on bay algorithms it starts to pay off. Biggest difficulty is to get easy access to data from insulin pumps and other medical devices. My personal data are locked and I can’t choose what to do with them. That hurts. As more health can be reached by making health data available to its users I don’t get why pump and meter companies don’t participate in innovation. Nevertheless we figured a hidden access point. Perseverance always wins!

By the end of 2016 we finally figured a manner which suits our platform to extract raw data from Fitbit’s platform. We can thus continue our road to a predictive algorithm where treatment improvements are enhanced by reducing clinical inertia. Clinical inertia is data fatigued induced by the overload of data in the clinical setting. Presenting treatment data comprehensively is the solution here. And we found the how but we won’t share it for now… Hang in for the solution.

I bought the newest Fitbit charge a month ago and it has brought me great insight in my health and how not using a Fitbit actually hurts my health. The newest models are more accurate and have more options available for sports and health monitoring.

Here’s three ways how Fitbit improves my health monitoring and management:

• The biggest win: heart rate monitoring. It’s not perfectly accurate but the tendencies across weeks provide insights in what lifestyle choices improve or reduce stress.
• Continuous sports tracking: by getting reminders on the amount of sport and how intensive the work outs are I am always working towards a new goal.
• Sleep and heart rate: Seeing how my heart rate pops in days where my nights are no longer than 5 hours I started to understand the positive influence of a good night sleep. Working on improving the amount of sleep but with my current schedule that’s a hurdle. Work in progress!

Some studies state that by just using a Fitbit activity levels are improved.
A Fitbit turns health into an ongoing project within reach of your own possibilities.