Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Apple Watch can detect hypertension and sleep apnea, a new study suggests

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 184 posts

Re: The Apple Watch can detect hypertension and sleep apnea, a new study suggests

#141

Post by brandonb »

smnscu wrote: post #73

The only downside to the Apple Watch in my book is the short battery life which should theoretically make it impractical for sleep tracking. I was recently stupefied to discover Nokia Steel [1] and how virtually unknown it is to the general public, my former self included. It comes with great design, no bullshit digital screen, the usual tracking features, and most importantly seems like it's a return to form for Nok…

I have a lot of friends who love the Steel!

Cardiogram is compatible with Apple Watch, and launched for Android Wear in October:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/cardiogram/id1000017994?ls=1...

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.cardiogram...

Our goal is to support any device with a heart rate sensor over time.

Re: The Apple Watch can detect hypertension and sleep apnea, a new study suggests

#142

Post by brandonb »

rvanmil wrote: post #37
fleetingmoments wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What input signals do you have access to through the Apple Watch? Is it only Heart Rate output or do you get the actual interbeat intervals? Any chance of getting to the raw ADC output of the photodiode?

I've written a blog about this a while ago [0]. You're limited to what HealthKit allows you to query and the RR intervals are not available. With the release of WatchOS 4 however the SDNN heart rate variability can be queried. [0] https://www.vanmil.org/heart-rate-variability-and-brain-wave...

Yes. Apple Watch takes measurements every five minutes (no RR intervals yet). There are a few popular watches, like Garmin, that do support RR intervals.

Re: The Apple Watch can detect hypertension and sleep apnea, a new study suggests

#143

Post by brlewis »

rhinoceraptor wrote: post #133
brlewis wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The other impediment to sleep tracking with Apple Watch is its heart rate measurements. One can get acceptable sleep tracking just from accelerometer data, but to get something like Fitbit's sleep tracking you need to measure heart-rate variability. Apple Watch's intermittent heart rate measurements (outside of workout mode) might make certain health metrics difficult to gather without killing the battery. Theoretica…

The apple watch measures heart rate every 5 minutes, and it does do HRV as of watch OS 4.

Fitbit Ionic "Stores heart rate data at 1 second intervals during exercise tracking and at 5 second intervals all other times" - https://www.fitbit.com/shop/ionic#specs

I don't know how much useful information you can get from the variability of a metric you only sample every 5 minutes.

Re: The Apple Watch can detect hypertension and sleep apnea, a new study suggests

#144

Post by brandonb »

ForFreedom wrote: post #22
brandonb wrote: post #3

I'm one of the co-founders of Cardiogram and involved in this study -- happy to answer questions if folks have them! (EDIT: heading to bed, but will answer questions in the morning!)

What do you do with the data collected via your app? Whats the end result of your research? Did the 70% people you collected data are aware?

The 70% of people were aware—they enrolled in an IRB-approved study with UCSF Health eHeart Study, and went through an explicit informed consent process (as medical research generally requires). We wrote a bit more about the end goal in the last section of the blog post here: https://blog.cardiogr.am/screening-for-hypertension-and-slee...

Re: The Apple Watch can detect hypertension and sleep apnea, a new study suggests

#145

Post by brandonb »

demomode wrote: post #78
joesb wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is saying to use this to replace going to the doctors. It's for you to just download the app, try it for a night, and see the doctor if the result concern you. It doesn't have to be hundreds percent accurate. Are you against teaching people to do self check-up of breast cancer, too? Because I'm sure medical process of checking for breast cancer requires more complicate tools than just feeling your breast with…

Apnea has obvious signs (fatigue, day sleep, depression, …) that are the equivalent of the "self check-up" in your example of breast cancer. If you suspect that you have apnea episodes you should go to a doctor.

80% of people with sleep apnea don't know they have it. Unfortunately, the signs are not obvious to most.

Re: The Apple Watch can detect hypertension and sleep apnea, a new study suggests

#146

Post by 013a »

doikor wrote: post #38
downandout wrote: post #34

I'm skeptical about the accuracy of applications like this running on Apple Watch. I bought the Apple Watch Series 3 precisely because of articles like this. I now routinely get messages about how I've achieved my standing goal - while lying in bed watching TV or working on my laptop. If it can't accurately tell whether you're lying down or standing, it is unimaginable to me that it could be remotely accurate in dete…

> I now routinely get messages about how I've achieved my standing goal - while lying in bed watching TV or working on my laptop. I routinely get messages about having to stand up while standing up on my standing desk at work. (Series 2 here)

Apple calling it a "standing goal" is a misnomer. Its more of a walking goal. I'm pretty confident that they're actually looking for 1 minute of consistent steps every hour.

Re: The Apple Watch can detect hypertension and sleep apnea, a new study suggests

#147

Post by brlewis »

Eric_WVGG wrote: post #132
brlewis wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not a lawyer. In high school I took a class that covered some aspects of contract law. Want my speculation? I do know something about the financial incentives, though. Fitbit's users are its customers. Insurers and employers are a small part of revenue. The people Fitbit needs to keep happy are users.

Ehhh... one of the big fights a decade ago was over DRM being built into CPUs and displays to the behest of entertainment companies. (They seem to have won that fight, as I now cannot find a lightning to hdmi cable that is “compatible” with Netflix.) During the years over which that controversy raged, I was always struck by the fact that companies like Microsoft and Intel were bending over backward to cater to Hollyw…

The DRM situation was such that Hollywood had the power to deny access to something Microsoft and Intel's customers wanted. Those companies might fear that if they didn't implement DRM, customers would buy a competitor's display or CPU that did implement DRM and let them watch movies.

I don't really see what the analogous situation would be with insurers and Fitbit. Fitbit won't lose customers to a competitor that violates their privacy.

Re: The Apple Watch can detect hypertension and sleep apnea, a new study suggests

#148

Post by marpstar »

givinguflac wrote: post #125
carlmcqueen wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This perception of low battery life has really lasted from the first apple watch. It was the reason, along with that it wasn't water proof enough for me, that I didn't get the first one. I wear my apple watch 2 all day, sleep in it, and charge it in the time I'm getting ready in the morning. that's all it needs and it never runs out of battery.

I completely agree; I wore my watch series 3 (no cell) all day yesterday, tracked sleep last night, and this morning I still have 65% battery left. I quick charge while I shower in the morning is all it's needed and I'm blown away by how long it lasts. (I had a Pebble Time previously.)

I had low expectations when I bought the Series 3 because of what has been said in the past about the battery life but my findings are similar: I put it on in the morning at 7:30am and it's still got ~65% when I'm getting ready for bed. I took it off last night around 11:30 and it was charged back to 100% by 12:15.

I too had a Pebble Time and while that lasted seemingly forever, I'm very very happy with the Series 3's battery life and charge time.

Re: The Apple Watch can detect hypertension and sleep apnea, a new study suggests

#149

Post by 013a »

omginternets wrote: post #77
justinjlynn wrote: post #11

Danger, danger: heavily regulated waters ahead! Remember these words well: "This statement has not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease."

I came to say "danger, danger" but for another reason. I think a whole generation of fitbit users are going to be horrified when their insurance premiums go up based on data that was purchased by insurers. If Apple watch starts making a health play, I don't see why it would be any different.

If you don't see any reason why it would be different, you're not looking.

Apple is aggressively privacy focused. Apple is the most valuable company in the world, and none of that money has come from selling users' data despite the fact that they're sitting on probably the second most valuable corporate dataset in the world (behind Google).

And while Fitbit might also be very clear about their users' privacy, they don't share one quality Apple has: a virtual guarantee that they won't go under new ownership in the near future.

Re: The Apple Watch can detect hypertension and sleep apnea, a new study suggests

#150

Post by brlewis »

maxerickson wrote: post #111
brlewis wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not a lawyer. In high school I took a class that covered some aspects of contract law. Want my speculation? I do know something about the financial incentives, though. Fitbit's users are its customers. Insurers and employers are a small part of revenue. The people Fitbit needs to keep happy are users.

No need to speculate. Of course it would be reassuring if there was something in the privacy policy that directly addressed the question. There is stuff like If we are involved in a merger, acquisition, or sale of assets, we will continue to take measures to protect the confidentiality of personal information and give affected users notice before transferring any personal information to a new entity. But "measures" a…

IMO something that specifically addressed an acquisition wouldn't add anything.

Either Fitbit's acquirer is contractually bound by the privacy policy or it isn't. If it isn't, then the specifics about acquisition don't add anything. If it is, then "We pledge...to never sell your personal data" is enough.

FWIW, Fitbit's publicly traded stock is non-voting, so hostile takeover is not possible.

Post reply on HN