This is the really interesting Thing!!!!
And: how they can have different ROM content (code) for each chip
265 karma · joined November 12, 2020
For convenience and my experiment, I eat practically the same meals at lunch every day, precisely weighed, always starting from very similar morning glucose levels, and strictly respecting timing and consistency.
I NEVER get the same response. Never. It’s an experiment I’ve been running on myself for a year. It’s useful for me, but for the diabetes team following me, “that’s not possible, there must be other factors, it doesn’t show, it’s the ‘CGM algorithm’” (a mystical object no one knows anything about, except that it’s supposedly intelligent).
This study is interesting. I hope this kind of information, this doubt, trickles down into the medical community. Even though I don’t have much hope. Maybe in years and years.
However, everything is complicated by numerous factors and the technology you use.
Factors: how you feel, stress, exercise, what you ate in previous meals, your blood sugar level at the start of the meal, and the activities you’ll engage in after the meal (physical or mental).
There’s also the issue of how you administer insulin.
In Italy, up until 3-5 years ago, most of us were using the “multiple daily injections” method, which involved taking a dose of “long-acting” insulin (lasting 24 hours) as a “base” and using “rapid or ultra-rapid” insulin at meals. Clearly, this approach provides limited control and requires a VERY habitual lifestyle (you can’t skip a meal; the long-acting insulin keeps working regardless).
Now (at least here in Italy), we are all transitioning to or already using CGM systems, which are more or less intelligent systems that continuously administer insulin at a “medium” rate. Based on input from the patient regarding the predicted amount of carbohydrates (and fats) they will consume, the system calculates the best strategy for what is called the “meal bolus” (using strategies like multi-phase, direct, etc.) and at the same time, it maintains a continuous but adaptable level of injection to achieve a target blood sugar level (day and NIGHT!!)
In essence, it’s a very nerdy way of dying slowly (hopefully as slowly as possible).
È un mondo difficile E vita intensa Felicità a momenti E futuro incerto
I guarantee you, it’s an incredibly complex task. Unless one adopts a monastic approach of always eating exactly the same carefully measured meals at home, the challenge is constant.
If one day a system based on vision and AI could accomplish this task (and it can't, it’s impossible), it could charge any price and have millions of users.
A few months ago, an update to Roche's DiabetLoop (DBLG1) created a thousand problems with emails recommending temporary tricks, subsequent updates, etc.
It’s unclear how such a serious issue didn’t surface during QA testing for a system that is, ultimately, fully under the control of the manufacturer (hardware/software).
I see a lot of effort to ensure the ecosystem is increasingly closed, touting the need for security of devices that can be fatal, but, in reality, there's little attention given. (And I say this because bugs and issues that everyone reports are always present, they're known, and they’re not being addressed.)
Tieni duro. Non ti disunire
I honestly cannot understand how a sane person can enter the water knowing that any problem, a hole, a higher wave is an almost certain death sentence.
Could it be that in addition to teaching us to swim, our parents taught us to fear and respect the sea? And that this simple precaution "is out of fashion"?