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FDA authorizes first wearable device that monitors ketone and blood sugar levels

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Re: FDA authorizes first wearable device that monitors ketone and blood sugar levels

#91
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In what way? Nondiabetic folks self regular glucose just fine on their own.

That's what I thought too, until I got my last bloodwork results and started wearing one of the OTC continuous glucose monitors. That device helped a lot to switch diet habits.

Can you be specific about what your bloodwork results showed and what special insights your CGM gave you and what behavioural changes it led to?

My anecdotal experience from doctor colleagues giving CGM to patients is that it does 3/5ths of fuck all to everyone except those with actual insulin dependent diabetes (T1 or T2) because when you get down to it the insights aren’t that great and most people actually aren’t that invested in shifting the dial on their health that much. But I’m fascinated by examples to the contrary

Re: FDA authorizes first wearable device that monitors ketone and blood sugar levels

#92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It can happen in people with uncontrolled T2D as well. My cofounder is a pediatric ICU doctor who has treated hundreds of DKA patients. Also there wasn't really a relationship of the keto diet to the rest of my post, just using it to contextualize a technical term with one that might be more familiar.

> It can happen in people with uncontrolled T2D as well. My cofounder is a pediatric ICU doctor who has treated hundreds of DKA patients. Yes, but you have to work really hard for many years to achieve this! While on T1D it happens by default if you don't inject insulin. > while the new system also measures ketones, of keto diet fame, which are leading indicators of a really dangerous situation called diabetic ketoac…

Ah yes, I see what you mean! Ketones are not inherently bad, just the accumulation of them w.r.t having diabetes. Should have made that more clear.

Re: FDA authorizes first wearable device that monitors ketone and blood sugar levels

#93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if there are any legs in an internal sensor that pushes out its reading every x? That seems pretty plausible.

Invasive CGMs (Continuous Glucose Monitor) and minimally invasive CGMs exist. It's the non-invasive CGMs which are being worked on because managing an implant or having something always poking through you is a big annoyance+risk compared to wearing a watch, ring, or patch. The problems for these non-invasive options so far is they either too easily fail to work, are bulky/expensive, give very ballpark accuracies, or…

The biggest problem is that they are racist. Optical blood sugar sensing devices were developed a decade ago. They were pretty accurate for pale white people, ballpark for most skin tones and don’t work at all for Black people. Good luck bringing that to market. Apple threw out the whole product and restarted with infrared.

Re: FDA authorizes first wearable device that monitors ketone and blood sugar levels

#94
post #87
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Automated glucose control will be the next frontier in so many areas of healthcare. What areas do you have in mind outside of diabetes management?

Blood glucose levels affect lots of health functions. Diabetes represents an extreme end of the spectrum where the body's ability to regulate these fluctuations fails, but just because your body can get your levels in control eventually doesn't mean you won't suffer from the negative effects of it needing to do so. Maintaining consistent glucose levels improves mental health, weight management, sleep quality, muscle…

sample of 1, but yeah changing my diet (very low sugar, more veggies) did alter my health visibly and rapidly. to the point that if I eat something too sweet too fast i have a very mild headache soon after, my system readjusted to not seek levels i grew up with

Re: FDA authorizes first wearable device that monitors ketone and blood sugar levels

#95
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the same way a step counter encourages people to walk more, a glucose monitor on your watch could discourage you from eating that extra donut

Does a step counter do that? All studies I've seen say they don't cause people to adapt their behavior

This study says otherwise: https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2007/11/pedometers-he...

Even if it doesn’t increase steps on average, it will absolutely still work with someone who’s self-motivated and not just looking for a quick fix.

Re: FDA authorizes first wearable device that monitors ketone and blood sugar levels

#96

Automated glucose control will be the next frontier in so many areas of healthcare. I'm still skeptical that anyone will be able to noninvasively and accurately sense blood sugar, but I'm glad people (especially kids with T1) will have one more tool to help them. I hope they can figure out the reimbursement side to get it into the most hands possible!

Automated glucose control is already available via wearable insulin pumps combined with CGMs in a 'closed loop' system.

Re: FDA authorizes first wearable device that monitors ketone and blood sugar levels

#97
post #2

bet marathoners and ultra runners will start using this to improve performance (don't have a problem with that, but it's predictable) too bad it's not "wearable" like a watch but that might be coming eventually too since Garmin has a patent on it * https://the5krunner.com/2026/02/06/garmin-non-invasive-blood... (btw Fenix 9 launched today but it's same hardware as Fenix 8 and no glucose feature)

Amateur cyclists already wear CGMs, and as a type 1 myself, they see mine and start asking all about CGMs. It must be so boring for them to worry about fluctuations between 85 and 120.

I don’t think amateur cyclists will have much to gain from this other than satisfying their curiosity.

Before buying one, just know that fit cyclists will appear glucose intolerant on a CGM. See Fig. 1 at https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10933193/

Re: FDA authorizes first wearable device that monitors ketone and blood sugar levels

#99

Automated glucose control will be the next frontier in so many areas of healthcare. I'm still skeptical that anyone will be able to noninvasively and accurately sense blood sugar, but I'm glad people (especially kids with T1) will have one more tool to help them. I hope they can figure out the reimbursement side to get it into the most hands possible!

Automated glucose control is already available via wearable insulin pumps combined with CGMs in a 'closed loop' system.

None have been approved for hospital use as of yet, which is the next frontier.

Re: FDA authorizes first wearable device that monitors ketone and blood sugar levels

#100
post #88

Ketones are only going to be present if you are exceptionally bad (very high carb diet) or exceptionally good (very low carb diet) at managing your blood sugar. It's not going to be terribly useful for your average diabetic who has fairly good control over their blood sugars.

Which makes me think the market for these is diet-focused folk. Get the FDA to clear it on medical grounds for a specific usecase then sell it more broadly.

This already happens with CGMs. The bulk of the sales is with people who want them for lifestyle monitoring even though they're only medically cleared for diabetes use.

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