Introduction:
A research study conducted by Stanford in collaboration with the Apple research team revealed that the Apple Watch heart monitor which comes with an inbuilt Apple Health feature, and is meant to detect atrial fibrillation, otherwise known as the AFib, could also detect some additional arrhythmic irregular heartbeats. This was one of the largest studies conducted by Apple in partnership with Stanford in 2017 since it had more than forty thousand participants enrolled within its study. The Apple Watch’s health features initially included the potential of detecting atrial fibrillation and notifying the user amongst one of its primary health features. This feature was added to the device along with its Series 4 update, which was also known to add an ECG or an electrocardiography sensor.
Apple Watch Health Features
The Apple Watch heart monitor was one of the most revolutionary updates to be introduced under the Apple Health feature. The ECG Apple Watch heart monitor could detect atrial fibrillations beforehand thereby saving the user from the risk of a possible cardiac arrest. The Apple Healthcare center however never planed the device to also start detecting irregular heartbeats. The device was presently designed to take ECG and the irregularities that could happen in heartbeats in general. The study conducted however shows that the ECG linked to the watch also detected arrhythmias in some cases, in addition to the regular atrial fibrillations.
The results that were derived from the study conducted actually revealed the reasons why the watch may detect irregular arrhythmic heartbeats. Apple has always promoted self-awareness when it comes to its health features and that was the sole purpose for the invention of the watch- to be more aware of your pre-existing health conditions. Apple has also never claimed to be super accurate with its device but has always posed it as something which could be an indicator of worsening health. It has always been posed as a pre-warning of sorts. But over several years of usage, there have been varied stories from Apple consumers who have reported additional benefits to wear the watch and monitoring their health- benefits which were not really promised by the device. Over the years several Apple watches heart monitor users notified that they were able to ward off serious diseases, thanks to the atrial fibrillation notification feature which made them catch up on their doctors early on.
The study which was conducted additionally showed that a large chunk of the users, almost as high as forty percent, did not find anything related to atrial fibrillations when they consulted their doctors and underwent an ECG. rather there were other irregularities in heartbeats or arrhythmias present in their system, which was also picked up by the Apple Health feature. These arrhythmias typically included everything from non-sustained ventricular tachycardia, premature atrial complications to premature ventricular contractions and other complexes. However, it must also be mentioned that these arrhythmias are more or less common and do not usually indicate anything fatal. They may be experienced as something common like heart palpitations. But people who experience premature contractions might have some serious underlying condition and therefore need to consult with their concerned doctors.
The results of the study conducted were published in the Circulation Journal. It also revealed that almost 33.3% of the people who had no symptoms of atrial fibrillations showed other heart conditions, that was picked up by the Apple Watch. These people, on undergoing electronic cardiography had other conditions and could treat the same in due time. This meant that the Apple Watch had been picking up cases of diseases that even the ECG patch could have missed. This meant that the Apple Watch has been much more efficient than what could have been suggested when the test runs were carried out.
Conclusion:
Apple is always on the lookout for introducing new updates and new technologies with the use of advanced sensors within its devices and the Apple Watch is no exception. There is a lot of conjecture around technical abilities and newer potential sensors that could be introduced to the new generation o Apple devices. But what this study single-handedly achieved was to delve deep into the untapped potential of the already existing sensors and technologies. Extensive studies conducted by Apple, like the Apple Heart and Movement Study or simply the Apple Heart Study thus have proven to provide newer pathways in health studies. The Apple Watch showing insightful results in terms of detecting other arrhythmias might just be emblematic of the fact that there is much more scope for research and development within the Apple Healthcare industry for the future.
