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184 points yeatsy | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0.199s | source

Hi HN,

I’m Joshua, a student, and I’m excited (and a little nervous) to share something deeply personal that I’ve been working on: Islet, my diabetes management app powered by GPT-4o-mini. It’s now on the App Store, but I want to be upfront—it’s still very much in its early stages, with a lot more to go.

I was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes while rowing competitively, and that moment changed everything. It wasn’t just the practical challenges of managing insulin, carb counts, and blood sugars; it fundamentally shifted how I see myself and the world. It forced me to slow down, prioritise my health, and take control in ways I never had to before. My outlook on life became more focused on resilience, adaptability, and finding solutions to problems that truly matter.

This app started as a pet project over the summer, a way to see what I could create using ChatGPT and explore the potential of LLMs to help with real-world challenges. At first, it was just about making my own diabetes management easier—understanding patterns in blood sugars, planning meals, and adjusting routines. But as I worked on it, I realised it could do more.

Right now, Islet offers personalised meal suggestions, tracks activity, and provides basic insights based on the data you enter. It’s far from complete. Even so, the process of building Islet has already taught me so much about how powerful AI can be in creating personal, meaningful tools.

This project is deeply tied to how my diagnosis changed me. It’s about more than managing diabetes, it’s about showing how anyone, even a student experimenting over the summer, can use AI to potentially solve real, personal problems. I believe tools like LLMs have the power to democratise solutions for all, making life just a bit easier for all of us.

If you’re curious, you can check it out here: https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/islet-diabetes/id6453168642. I’d love to hear your thoughts what works, what doesn’t, and what features you think would make it better. Your input could help shape the next steps for Islet.

Thanks for reading !

joshua

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windex ◴[] No.42170195[source]
I wish thyroid disorders were easier to measure as well, just like Blood Sugar is. Does anyone know of proxies to actual blood tests for thyroid level management?
replies(1): >>42172800 #
1. jermaustin1 ◴[] No.42172800[source]
As a person with Hashimoto's and struggle with Hashi flares that last a few weeks at a time, I've been working on a PWA that helps me track various things. It is "modular" and lets you track anything you want, so mine is set up to track medicine, food/diet, stress level, exercise, and I can export the text-log and email it to whoever I want.

I was daily driving it for a few weeks just to see if I wanted to do anything with it, but a flair up and life got in the way.

I have no real plan to release it, but I might add the PWA to github and maybe let other's actually run with it.