Ever Forget How Much Insulin You Took? These Apps Will Fix That
Editor’s Note: People who take insulin require consistently affordable and predictable sources of insulin at all times. If you or a loved one are struggling to afford or access insulin, you can build custom plans based on your personal circumstances through our tool, GetInsulin.org.
Physical logbooks can get cumbersome—plus they don’t do the math for you and tend to get coffee spilled on them—and logging insulin doses in your phone’s notes app can start to look like a jumble of inexplicable dates, times and numbers.
The good news? There are smartphone apps made just for this purpose—to track your insulin doses, do the math for you so you know how much insulin you still have on board from your last dose, and point out patterns.
This kind of logging is how you can more easily start to see patterns unique to your body and your diabetes—like how you may need a smaller bolus (insulin dose for food or to correct a high blood sugar) during the day when you’re up and moving around, or need to lower your long-acting insulin dose by a few units because you’re having persistent low blood sugars during the day.
What is not tracked cannot be measured and changed, so let’s make the tracking part easier! Here are some apps we recommend:
mySugr
Available on iOS and Android
mySugr was made by people with diabetes for people with diabetes and has a robust set of features for tracking not only insulin doses, but blood sugar levels, food, exercise and more. One of our favorite features is the mySugr Bolus Calculator – not currently available to U.S. users at this time – which does all the math for you for corrections or mealtimes based on the ratios you and your healthcare provider determined are best for your diabetes. However, other features that are available in the U.S. are being able to get an estimated A1C and share reports with your doctor.
You can also connect any Accu-Chek blood sugar meter so you don’t have to input blood glucose (BG) numbers manually and you can sync the app with your Google Fit® or Apple Health® tracker. This is a great all-in-one app—easy to use but comprehensive of everything helpful to track.
Dexcom or Freestyle Libre Continuous Glucose Monitor Apps
Available on iOS and Android
It’s a good idea for anyone who is using insulin to have a continuous glucose monitor (CGM). These devices give you a continuous look at your blood sugar levels throughout the day—including in what direction they are moving—instead of the single point in time that traditional blood sugar checks provide. This allows you to not only see trends and the impact of your insulin dosages, but receive alerts when your blood sugar is going too high or too low.
Both Dexcom and Freestyle Libre CGMs have smartphone apps that allow you to see your blood sugar levels on your phone. Additionally, in the apps you can log food, insulin doses, etc. so that you can see the impact of your activities on your blood sugar and notice trends based on things like type of food consumed, type of exercise done, etc.
Glooko
Available on iOS and Android
The Glooko app allows you to sync your data from your blood sugar meter, insulin pen or pump, CGM, activity tracker (like Fitbit or Strava, etc.), food tracker and more—it is compatible with the majority of devices and apps you could be using to help manage your health.
In addition to being able to log your insulin doses, you can also share your data through the app with your healthcare team so they can give you feedback on what shifts may be helpful to you. Based on their recommendations and your care plan, you can set up reminders for medication dosing, meals, blood sugar checks and more.
One Drop
Available on iOS and Android
One Drop, which can also be paired with the company’s blood sugar meter and test strip subscription service, is a free app for people with diabetes, prediabetes, high blood pressure and/or high cholesterol. It can be connected or synced with many other apps and health data trackers like Apple Watch, Fitbit, various blood sugar meters, food tracking apps and more.
Within the app, you can track blood sugar, insulin doses, medications, meals (with a large food database including a barcode scanner), activity, weight and blood pressure. You can also set reminders for blood glucose checks, medication dosing and more.
With the premium paid version of the app, you can sign up for a personal health coach to answer questions and provide feedback, as well as utilize their data-forecasting tool, which tracks patterns and gives feedback on where you may expect your blood sugar to go based on trends.
One Touch Reveal
Available on iOS, Android and web
One Touch Reveal, which can also be paired with the One Touch Verio Flex meter, is a free app for people who track blood sugar. The app automatically notifies you of repeated high or low blood sugar patterns so you can take action to adjust your care plan. The app “organizes your blood sugar results in a color-coded logbook and dashboards that link with your logged food, insulin and activity.” You can share your data with friends, family or healthcare providers.
The app also calculates your expected A1c based on your daily blood sugar data, allows you to set goals and reminders for how many blood sugar checks you’d like to aim for every day, and more.
Educational content related to insulin use and insulin logging methods for type 2 diabetes is made possible with support from Lilly Diabetes. Beyond Type 2 maintains full editorial control of all content published on our platforms.
