Most diabetes apps lack actual-time recommendation on blood sugar control

ANN ARBOR: Hundreds of telephone apps promise to make dealing with diabetes less complicated. However, only a few offer real-time steerage on what to do for dangerously high or low blood sugar, a US study suggests.

Researchers checked out 185 apps for telephones running Google’s Android software program or Apple’s iOS devices.

Out of this general, they determined 371 apps that claimed to provide several critical components for diabetes management: Recording blood sugar statistics, reminding patients when they want to do specific things to control the illness, and teaching patients how to deal with conditions like dangerously low or high blood sugar.

“People with diabetes will need to make many decisions regarding not only the simplest diet and lifestyle but also which medicine to take and what to rely on, depending on their blood sugar levels,” stated senior study author Dr. Josip Car of the Center for Population Health Sciences at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore.

“Apps ought to doubtlessly help some components of self-management – if properly designed,” Car stated by email. “But we have a look at demonstrates the immaturity of diabetes apps and overlooked opportunities to improve care and fitness effects.”

The study centered only on sufferers with type 2 diabetes, the most common form, which is related to obesity and again,g and takes place. At the same time, the body can’t use or make enough of the hormone insulin to convert blood sugar into electricity. Left untreated, diabetes can cause nerve damage, amputations, blindness, coronary heart disease, and strokes.

Roughly one in thirteen humans with diabetes who own personal smartphones use an app to control their circumstances, researchers found in JAMA.

Earlier research suggested that using an app that supports blood sugar management may additionally help people achieve decreased blood sugar levels than they can on their own, the study team writes. Every app within the modern-day analysis allowed people to track their blood sugar levels.