About two years ago, we had an unfortunate surprise. Our little five-year-old boy was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. Not only was the hit very hard on our family, but ten days later, our youngest son had developed the same disease (two out of three of our children). This post will explain how we improved our lives with the xDrip Bridge for Type 1 Diabetes.
Does the bundle come with instructions for those of us who are not technologically savvy? Also does ir work with any dexcom with share and any android phone? Finally what’s the total price of the bundle and is any extra monthly service needed aside from typical cell service with data plan for the android?
According to the Nightscout website, you can use the Dexcom with share without the need of an xDrip bridge since your Dexcom already support sharing http://www.nightscout.info/wiki/faqs-2/how-do-you-get-your-cgm-in-the-cloud. All you need is the xDrip app running on an Android phone with a Nightscout website.
Typical setup includes hosting the Nightscout website in the cloud using Azure and we fall in the “free tier” since data usage is very low. You have to make sure to double-check your setup to make sure you are configured to use free tier or you might receive an invoice. Also, I didn’t use a SIM card for our phone. Since Wi-Fi is available both at school and kindergarten, we didn’t want to pay for a cellphone plan. So, no monthly service is required.
The requirement for the Android cellphone is to support BLE (Bluetooth Low Energy). We didn’t want them to carry an expensive smartphone so we are using the Melrose S9 for our kids. (A Chinese smartphone) It’s a very popular phone for this application since it’s inexpensive, small and compatible with the xDrip application.
The xDrip bridge will capture glucose sensor readings and send it to a Phone while the Parakeet uses a SIM card to send data to the internet. While you still need a phone at home with the xDrip application installed to interpret data, the kid do not need to carry the phone at school which could be restricted in some schools. (And the kid won’t risk losing the phone.)
While optional, the resistors allow the xDrip to report the current battery voltage in the application. Because of the resistors, I can see the % battery remaining right on the smartphone application.
The resistors make a simple voltage divider so that the battery voltage read by the Wixel is between acceptable range.
You can see where those resistors should be installed in the schema found in page 10 of this document:
It very useful for us since we have two different xDrip to charge. But if battery voltage is not required for you, you can skip this step and save some soldering.
You are right, I forgot to add the resistors in the “parts list” section but they are included in the kit. I’ll add them right now. Thanks!
Unfortunately for us, the Dexcom G5 is still not available in Canada. Therefore, we needed a solution that worked with the G4.
Also, I think that Dexcom share is working on Apple devices only. We do not want to buy two brand new iPhones for our kids. The Melrose S9 is smaller and much less expensive.
Thanks Yannic, I have been exploring the xdrip over the last few days. I hope you can clarify a few things specifically for Canadians.
Can I use the xdrip bridge without a working receiver. (mine is not taking very much of a charge…3yrs.old)
Do I need to have the phone that is running the software with me at all times or will a smart watch receive the blue tooth from the bridge. I really need to talk to someone either in person or over the phone, would you be willing to talk to me? If so, send number and best time to call dmorisse at mymts.net
There is no problem with using the xDrip without a working receiver. Think of the xDrip as a second receiver. I personally use it as a backup, but one day, our receiver died just before going camping, so we relied only on the xDrip for a few days without any issues. The maximum range is a little less than the standard receiver though. It’s also very useful to have the xDrip reading data while the standard receiver is still in its 2 hour warm-up phase.
Yes, you need the phone with you. The phone is like a second receiver. If it’s out of range, it won’t receive any data. However, the phone doesn’t need to always have internet access. Readings that were not uploaded will all be uploaded when internet is available again (so you’ll still have a complete graph in the Nightscout website).
Can you post your other questions on the blog (if possible)? Your question might prove useful to other readers.
looks good and i love the idea pitty about the companies charge of £51 per 7 days and then £200 every 30 just to keep this device running. i was really getting excited about this until i gave them a call on the cost for the sensors
Hi I was wondering if anyone knows of a way to us the parakeet of xDrip to transmit data directly to an arduino or rasberrypi through a wired connection or Bluetooth.
The xDrip send RAW data to the phone who has to interpret the signal & convert to glucose level by taking account of calibrations. That’s why you couln’t use the raw data of the xDrip bridge directly without the xDrip application.
However, once the phone uploaded data, the Nightscout website comes with a great JSON API that you can you with an Arduino or Raspberry PI easily.
Look at that Arduino sample here displaying BG on an arduino lcd using Wifi:
Here are sample of the Nightscout API usage:
And a sample response from the website
{
status: [
{
now: 1487343963796
}
],
bgs: [
{
sgv: “78”,
trend: 4,
direction: “Flat”,
datetime: 1487343781000,
bgdelta: -3,
battery: “100”,
iob: “-0.52”,
cob: 5425.7
}
],
cals: [ ]
}
Would this work with some kind of smart watch? I have an Animas Vibe, which has a dexcom receiver built in, but it would be nice to not have to fish it out of my pocket constantly to check my BG.
