The Fitbit Ionic in action during a workout in August (Photo by Dave Kotinsky/Getty Images)
Fitbit announced a partnership on Tuesday with cloud-based diabetes care management platform One Drop to help Fitbit users with diabetes better manage the disease.
One Drop will build an app specifically for the Fitbit Ionic that will show users directly from their wrists how physical activity can impact blood glucose levels. For people with diabetes, exercise can lower blood glucose and make their body more sensitive to insulin.
Starting in November, One Drop users will be able to sync intraday biometric data from any Fitbit device to their One Drop accounts, which will allow for the automatic upload of things such as sleep tracking, heart rate and physical activity, which previously had to be manually inputted.
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Detailed data recorded by Fitbit devices can be sent to physicians and certified diabetes educators to make more personalized care decisions with patients.
One Drop will also analyze Fitbit data along with One Drop’s 500 million user-generated health data points to surface deeper insights about how to best manage diabetes and explore new research opportunities to enhance future product innovation with the diabetes community in mind.
“We strive to provide our community with the most comprehensive set of data and tools to manage their diabetes or prediabetes. Working with Fitbit, the leading global wearables brand, was a natural next step for One Drop,” One Drop CEO Jeff Dachis said in a statement.
This summer at a media event ahead of the Ionic launch, Fitbit set an ambitious goal to evolve into medical devices, using its first smartwatch as a platform to deliver more comprehensive health and fitness services. The company said it would begin using data connected from its devices and working with third-party companies in the health field to begin predicting and helping to prevent medical disorders and diseases.
“Our mission is to help make the world healthier, and our new Ionic smartwatch is the health platform that allows us to deliver our most advanced health and fitness features to the market,” said Adam Pellegrini, General Manager Fitbit Health Solutions.
