Frequently Asked Questions
Simpancreas

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I greatly appreciate your interest in approaching me to try to learn more about my work with technologies related to the control of Type I Diabetes.

It has been +5 years since I started experimenting to create my own insulin dosing control system (simpancreas) and in the time that has elapsed since then, the industry has changed and continues to change. The most important and valuable thing for me has been the great community around Type I Diabetes which I am very proud to be a part of.

For whatever reason you came here, I think that here are some of the answers to the most frequently asked questions I receive related to my work with software related to type I diabetes:

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1. Me, a family member or an acquaintance have diabetes, can you guide me with my treatment or help me learn more about my condition?

No. I am not a doctor nor do I pretend to be one and therefore I cannot give advice or recommendations that could affect a treatment for diabetes and health in general. There are health professionals dedicated to treating people with Diabetes and each case is unique and special and requires the professional care of a trained person. If you want to learn more about your treatment, your results, or anything else related to taking care of your body and diabetes, please please please consult a health professional.

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2. Do you know of any books or references that can help me better understand my diabetes?

Of course! There are lots of content online and in books to help you. A book that helped me a lot and that I always recommend is:
Think Like a Pancreas by Gary Schenier.

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3. I already know everything about treating type I diabetes with pumps and continuous glucose monitoring systems and I am interested in learning about related open-source technologies.

All my work has been published as open-source software in various places on the internet. The base algorithms of my simpancreas system can be found here:
GlucoDyn Source Code.

We have also created an interactive website that allows you to play with these algorithms visually and manually here:
Perceptus.org Interactive GlucoDyn Dashboard

In the same way, whenever I can I continue to develop tools with other collaborators and we share them on the Perceptus Github account and on my personal account here:
Perceptus on Github.
bustavo on Github.

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4. Can you help me build my own artificial pancreas?

No (see question 1). All these technologies have been developed thanks to freedom of expression and as such each person is responsible for what they decide to read, interpret, create, and use.

I cannot, nor do I think it is ethical to create such a complex and delicate system for someone else. I believe everything open-source and related to diabetes must be created by each person who is going to use it. If everyone does it this way, we ensure that each person has read the essential information to understand what they are doing, how each element of their system works, and this way they will be able to repair and adjust it as neeeded.

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5. I have understood everything, I want to build my own artificial pancreas.

Excellent! There are several open-source systems that are maintained by the type I diabetes community. Each has its advantages and disadvantages as well as different costs and requirements. I recommend you read about each of them here:

Loop. System developed for iPhone smartphones.

AndroidAPS. System developed for Google Android smartphones.

OpenAPS. System developed for Linux devices.

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6. I already have a pump and a continuous glucose monitoring system. I would like to be able to better integrate my technology with the internet.

There are several continuous glucose monitoring systems that already have applications connected to the internet such as those developed and sold by the Dexcom brand. If you use another one that does not have this functionality, there is probably a solution for you:

Nightscout. Remote monitoring system for continuous glucose monitoring systems. It integrates with the artificial pancreas systems mentioned in question 5.

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7. I am developing or want to develop my own artificial pancreas system. Could you help or advise me?

If your project is already advanced and you have already managed to build a prototype, I can gladly help you answering questions or guiding you with links or references. I have also developed an open-source tool to help projects from people like you here:

GlucoSym. People with Type I Diabetes Simulator. It allows you to connect your algorithm to this simulator and see how well it controls some standardized prototypes of people with Type I Diabetes.