I couldn’t find a symptom diary app which was private, easy to use, and customisable.
So I made one.
James Allen - app developer and “spoonie”
Works with Apple Watch and Wear OS
Read the Chronic Insights substack blog: where chronic illness meets science, mindfulness and poetry.
The symptom diary app we deserve
Made by someone who lives with chronic pain and fatigue every day
Record any symptom
Configure your symptom as a bar chart (for episodic symptoms like migraine) or a line chart (for continuous symptoms like chronic joint pain), choose your own rating scale, colour, assign tags for sorting and filtering, record notes, photos and more
Record factors, medications and body measurements
Factors are anything which you think might trigger or help your symptoms, record changes in medication dose and when you take or miss a medication, record body measurements like weight and waist circumference
Make pain visible by painting in 3D
Make your chronic pain real for others to see by drawing it onto 3D models. It’s so much easier to make people understand the pain you experience when you have high-impact 3D visuals and animations to back you up. A picture is worth a thousand words!
3D requires a subscription to premium
Including ESR, ALB, bilirubin, alkaline phosphatase, alanine aminotransferase, protein, CRP, sodium, potassium, urea, creatinine, full blood count, haematocrit, mean cell volume / haemoglobin, MCHC, cholesterol, triglycerides, CSF protein, CSF glucose, glucose, PSA, CA125, TSH, FT4, FT3, transglutaminase, testosterone, estradiol, estrone, estriol, FSH, LH, iron, transferrin, ferritin, TIBC and many more!
Record blood test results
Record urine test results
Including specific gravity, PH, protein, glucose, ketones, blood, leukocytes, nitrite, bilirubin, urobilinogen
Record medications
Record your history of changes in dosage for medications, and when you took or missed a medication
Record vitals
Including blood pressure, weight, blood glucose, temperature, oxygen saturation, heart rate, peak flow, bristol stool scale, menstrual flow, forced expiratory volume (FEV1), hours of sleep
Bring in weather data
Show up to 1 year of historical temperature, pressure, precipitation, humidity, cloud cover alongside your symptoms, and get a 3 day weather and air quality forecast
Weather requires a subscription to premium
Bring in fitness data from other sources
Connect other data sources to Chronic Insights using Health Connect (Android) or Apple Health (iPhone) to bring in steps, calories burned, heart rate, resting / walking heart rate, exercise, sleep, blood pressure, blood glucose, body fat, body temperature, distance, elevation gained, floors climbed, hydration, weight, oxygen saturation, nutrition
Record health impact questionnaires
Including the Bath AS disease index (BASDAI), Bath AS functional index (BASFI), revised fibromyalgia impact questionnaire (FIQR) and more to come
Record mood
Record mood by tapping emotion words, which converts into a measurable 2-axis mood scale
Get insights into your health condition
View your data in multiple different ways, create your own custom charts, compare symptoms with factors, vitals, medications, mood, physical activity and weather
Quick-record using Apple Watch or Wear OS watch
Quickly record symptoms, factors, vitals, medications and mood using your watch
Using the watch app requires a subscription to premium
Only works with Apple Watch series 3 or later, and Wear OS watches
Due to watch screen size limitations, the watch app does not support 3D
Take the tour
Supporting chronic illness charities
❤️ 10% for charity
Chronic Insights is more than just an app to me. It has become a mission to help people like us, who live with chronic illness every day. Part of this mission is to give back to charities who work tirelessly on our behalf, to provide support and assistance, a helpline, a voice.
How it works
Every year, I will donate 10% of revenue I receive from any Chronic Insights in-app subscriptions you sign up for to the charity of your choice (choose your charity from the list shown when you sign up)
Make chronic pain visible
Private by design
Hi, my name’s James, I’m a spoonie living with axial spondyloarthritis. Many apps make money by collecting your data and selling it to data brokers, advertisers and insurance companies. I didn’t want my private data on pain, fatigue, mood, my medications and other private details shared and sold to people I don’t know behind my back, so I designed my Chronic Insights app to be different.
Chronic Insights does not collect ANY health data, ever. There are no ads. No trackers. No email address, password or account required. I don’t have any corporate overlords, VCs or shareholders to answer to, so nobody can pressure me into changing my privacy policy to collect and monetize your health data. Just a 100% private symptom diary, funded by direct subscriptions from supporters like you.
You can get an idea of how much data apps are collecting about you by how long, complex and vague their privacy policies are. See my super-simple Privacy Policy written in plain english
Testimonials
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Cherise Stone
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I can't recommend this enough. I added so many conditions, symptoms, triggers etc., it handled them all and showed me so many ways to record and review. Unbelievably impressive! Not sure who created this App but I feel like it's someone who really knows what it is like to live with a chronic condition. My only request is that some triggers can also be helpful to a condition so would like option to choose both at same time. Don't bother trying any other app, this is what you need!
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Crystal Ann Catchpole-Barker
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Incredible app to help those with chronic illnesses, well set up with good options, and you can personalise everything to suit your needs. Would definitely recommend using it to share with health professionals, especially for those with 'invisible' illnesses. Extra charge for the 3D symptom tracker (which is still cheap), but otherwise, download and give it a go. Easy to export data to a pdf or other form of document. So glad that I found it.
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Jenivere S-H
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The free options are really useful and comprehensive. The ability to add symptoms and activities and define how I want to track them is very helpful too. Also very impressed at the speed of the reply from the creator regarding a suggestion for sorting items into groups or types of things for those of us who have a pretty long list. Looks great for tracking chronic symptoms for personal reference and to aid in diagnosis and/or welfare assessments too.
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Karen Vermeer
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Everything I wanted & needed in an app to quickly & accurately record my many, & confusing symptoms to try & understand them myself, & relay them to others, including medical professionals. It has everything I think you could possibly need for symptom recording, with virtually everything free & so professionally produced. I will be recommending this app at every given opportunity. Thank you so much.
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Kimberly Simpson
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I've been struggling to figure out how to track all the things I need. I tend to like the paper method, but there are so many factors to my condition, that was just overwhelming. I'm only a couple days in, but love that I could get in touch with the developer. (It wasn't my brain fog, but a small glitch in how the tags work, to be fixed at the next update). Going to subscribe to get the extra features!
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Elaine Stoots
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This has been the best for tracking my symptoms for Psoriatic arthritis. As I became more familiar with the app, I moved to tracking my other chronic conditions as well. The addition of FEV1 to the vitals section became invaluable to me. This one app replaced 3 other apps I was using to track my health. Now there's no excuses, and I can tell at a glance why I'm feeling off. It's soooooooo very customizable. Thank You for designing such a useful, user-friendly way of keeping track of ourselves.
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Dan Penrose Geneste
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genuinely very well designed and clearly made with a desire to help people in mind, the things behind a paywall do not disable the apps functionality but having them is not a waste if you want them. kudos developer, seriously, I know how expensive apps can be and the fact that you haven't compromised the quality of the app with ads and paywalls is highly commendable. I have already recommended this app to a few of my chronically ill friends :)
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Renee Matthews
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I highly recommend this app after about a month of use. It is easy to use and personalize. The app designer is very responsive and genuinely caring to spend time to help others by creating this app. I can record my numbers, test results, medications, daily symptoms, as well as changes throughout the day. Many apps want a once a day entry, but chronic illness doesn't work that way with roller coaster ups and downs. This gives me a much more accurate view of what triggers or relieves symptoms.
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Elisabeth Ball
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Great app. Super customizable. Exactly what I was looking for to track migraine triggers (way better than the other migraine tracking apps out there).
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New List Item
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Great app. Much better than all others I've tried. Extremely fast response to feedback. Possibility to track complex symptoms. 👏
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gasmann
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Wow wow wow. Lord have mercy..This app is out of this world . Perfection at its finest and at my finger tips. No other app compares , simple, easy, clear, straight forward, full of options, the ability to mark exactly were any pains is on the body image is a God sent game changer developed by a true child of God. Absolutely love using it. Thank you developer.. hope your well Sir. THANK YOU💙👊🏿. I will be telling everyone i know
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Bryce King
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Overall, a great app and very feature-rich. Wonderful support from the developer as well. Highly recommended if you have a chronic condition and want a single place to track symptoms/medications.
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Laura Ash
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This app is incredibly detailed. I almost cried when I realized how useful it was going to be. I'm new to integrating it to my routine but I feel confident that the 3D models and integration of real time weather charts are game changers. Would the ability to add notes on food/liquid intake for things like MCAS or o/w flares be a possibility in the future? The app is already incredibly well developed. This would just be an added assistive.
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Staley Wessel
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I am finding this to be a wonderful way to track everything. I have tried many methods on paper and never kept with it for more than a few months. With this I can easily add things in, rearrange them for convenience, and see how all the factors interact. I have not yet printed a report to take to the doctor but that will be handy. Also the developer responds to questions which is nice.
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Michael Harrison
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If you are trying to track a chronic condition by recording meds, mood, environmental conditions, triggers, fitness stats, and then be able to get insights on how they all interact with each other, plus the ability to create a 3D pain map of your body at any point in the day and see animation on how that changed over time, this is the app for you. Beautifully designed, all data you enter is fully editable and can be custom designed to collect information from an extremely wide range of sources
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Thomas Johnson
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I can't understand why this app isn't rated higher. I've tried various symptom trackers, and they all seemed to have a bunch of extra stuff I never used, we're confusing, or so limited without paying extra. This app is amazing, it has so many great features all free, and everything is super customizable. Why aren't more apps like this? So far no ads either!
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Gaye Durst
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I've never liked health/illness tracker apps before, I found most useless for my situationand out of my budget, until this one. There is an absolute abundance of customization, and the premium version is quite reasonable in cost, I'm now tracking things and finally connecting the dots so to speak, hopefully will lead to better care.
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Natasha Lucas
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amazing Ap and really good communication with James if you need. he added the Bristol Scale for me.. I thoroughly recommend, using this app has changed my life and knowledge of my condition.
MY MISSION: MAKING CHRONIC PAIN VISIBLE
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![Digital illustration of a human figure facing away, with an overlay of a colorful heat map on the body. To the right, a stylized skeleton sits at a desk, with a multicolored spine and a blue sphere as a head, against a dark background.]()
Axial spondyloarthritis
is a painful auto-immune condition affecting the spine, hips, neck, shoulders and other joints
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![Colorful thermal imaging style illustration of a woman standing with her arms outstretched, showing a vibrant heat map pattern.]()
Fibromyalgia
is a disorder of the nervous system which causes pain all over the body
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![3D digital model of a human head and neck with colorful heat map overlay showing different areas of activity or stress.]()
Migraine
is caused by over-stimulated nerves which leads to a cascade of chemicals to be released, causing pain and nausea
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![3D digital model of a human female figure with colored heat map overlay on her abdomen and pelvis area.]()
Endometriosis
is caused by cells similar to the ones in the uterus lining growing elsewhere in the body, causing inflammation, pain and the formation of scar tissue
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![A human figure standing with arms extended, featuring a colorful heat map overlay showing varying intensities across the body, indicating areas of pain or discomfort.]()
Ehlers-Danlos syndromes
are a group of conditions which cause the body’s connective tissue to become fragile and stretchy, causing pain and other symptoms
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![3D humanoid figure with a colorful heatmap overlay showing various temperature zones, standing with arms outstretched against a plain background.]()
Psoriatic arthritis
is an auto-immune condition affecting the skin and joints, causing pain, stiffness and inflammation
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![3D digital model of a human figure with multicolored heatmap data, standing with one arm extended onto a gray rectangular surface.]()
Chronic back pain
is a wide-spread problem, causing moderate-severe pain in an estimated 10-15% of western societies
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![A silver mannequin with a colorful heat map pattern on its lower limbs and torso, standing against a black background.]()
Chronic pelvic pain
is more intense than ordinary period pain and lasts longer. It affects around 1 in 6 women.
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![Three mannequins with colorful, abstract patterns, positioned with arms outstretched in different directions.]()
... AND MANY MORE
there are hundreds of long-term health conditions which cause chronic pain for millions of people around the world
My story
James Allen - app designer, developer, spoonie and founder of Chronic Insights“Living with chronic pain is hard. But there’s one thing that I’m grateful for - it made me really think about what I’m doing with my life, and question what I’m really passionate about. That’s what made me quit my job to create a better symptom diary app: one which is private, which doesn’t harvest your health data, which is made for people with chronic health conditions and not VCs or corporate shareholders. It’s the best thing that I’ve ever done.”
My name is James Allen, and I’ve lived with axial spondyloarthritis for most of my life. It changes every day, but pain is always there - in my spine, hips, shoulders, neck, ribs, and sometimes other joints too.
One thing that makes living with chronic pain difficult is how hard it is to describe, and to objectively recall how it has changed over time. So when it comes to seeing a doctor, it’s almost impossible to articulate in words how you’ve been feeling over the past several months, or to recall all the ups and downs and flare-ups.
Even worse, it can be difficult to judge if you’re getting better or worse over time, or if a new medication is helping or not, because all you’re thinking about is getting through each day at a time.
One thing that I found helped was recording my symptoms. But I didn’t like any of the symptom diary apps I tried - they didn’t have the features I wanted, they had shocking privacy policies, or they just didn’t work.
That’s why I decided to make a better, more private symptom diary which really lets you express how it feels to be you, living with chronic pain.
Questions?
Check out the user manual for answers to most questions about the app, or get in contact to report a bug, suggest a new feature or anything else!
Email: james@chronicinsights.com
Join me on Substack
Where chronic illness meets science, mindfulness and poetry. Less “just relax,” more “here’s how and why”. Subscribe to my Substack newsletter or read the blog for more calm, cameraderie, empowerment over chronic pain, and the occasional poem. I'm James, a spoonie with axial spondyloarthritis.
