J&J's Animas Latest To Team With Tidepool
Johnson & Johnson’s (J&J) Animas is the latest device maker to join forces with non-profit Tidepool, which provides open-source data access technology for patients with Type I Diabetes. The project aims to assist patients with disease management, as well as to collect and combine data from different devices into one coherent cloud to help advance diabetes research.
According to Howard Look, CEO and founder of Tidepool, each person owns their own health data, and it is up to the patients to decide how they want to use it and who they want to share it with.
“If you want to view it in an iPhone app that helps you with your diabetes, you should be able to do that. If you want to donate your data to an anonymized research database, you should be able to do that too,” said Look in an interview with Glu.
Since its 2013 launch, Tidepool has designed three apps for diabetes management by recording and analyzing both diabetes data and contextual (e.g., exercise, food, life events) data. Tidepool’s data hub, called Blip, helps patients share their data with their doctors and can process information from multiple devices at once. The company’s Sonar tool aids with “decision support,” while its Nutshell software keeps track of food and boluses required after each meal, plus makes bolus suggestions based on the body’s previous reactions.
All of this imputed app data is funneled into the Tidepool platform, a secure and HIPPA-compliant data cloud that can be accessed for free by researchers working on new diabetes innovations. In order to link to data from a large population of Type 1 diabetes patients, Tidepool has been forming partnerships with multiple type 1 diabetes device manufacturers: Dexcom, Asante, Insulet/OmniPod, Tandem, and Abbott all have joined.
Animas, acquired by J&J in 2006, is the most recent company to open its data to Tidepool. The company reported in a press release that it would begin work immediately to ensure that the Animas Vibe Insulin pump and CGM System, as well as the OneTouch Ping Glucose Management System, could work effectively with Tidepool apps and data sharing.
“By assisting in opening this door to better communication between patients, caregivers, physicians, and industry, we aim to influence better care and progress for the future,” said John Wilson, worldwide VP of insulin delivery for J&J Diabetes Solutions Companies, in a statement published by Tidepool.
Wilson also commented that the versatility of the apps would go a long way toward helping patients design their own management regimen and strategy. “A one-size-fits-all approach rarely works in any scenario, and it certainly doesn’t work for diabetes management,” he stated.
Last year, Tidepool partnered with the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF), a deal in which JDRF agreed to provide funding to further technological development. Derek Rapp, president and CEO of JDRF, said, “We are committed to ensuring that the data software available is safe, convenient and offers reliable access.”
According to Look, some device manufacturers have been reluctant to open their doors to Tidepool, but he believes that joining the cloud will only benefit device companies by removing the financial burden of software development, and will allow them to share in data that will, in turn, improve their own hardware.
“We strongly feel that when diabetes devices become part of an ecosystem that enables better, interoperable software to emerge, it will make all devices more valuable and will grow the market for all device makers,” said Look.