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The science behind on-the-wrist blood pressure tracking

empirical.health

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Re: The science behind on-the-wrist blood pressure tracking

#91

Post by crazymalhavoc »

throwup238 wrote: post #21
corry wrote: post #4

Actually, there is a wrist device called "Aktiia" that's approved for use for continuous BP monitoring with clinical accuracy by the UK and German health authorities (I believe). It's a bit of a pain to get over the pond, but with a shipment-forwarding company + a UK App Store account you can get up and running. I've dabbled a bit with it and it's very close to the cuff measurements. It works by calibrating with thei…

> However, one thing to be aware of is that you are not used to seeing your BP readings from the entire day. Same thing with those continuous glucose monitors that almost anyone can get and put on their arm now. The vast majority of the data and recommendations we have are for diabetics using regular single use measurements or a proper glucose tolerance test so shortly after the user eats a bowl of rice while wearing…

From my point of view, that's the whole point of wearing a continuous biometric monitor so that you can see the normal variation. These one off medical tests that people use to make major life and health decisions seems kinda crazy to me.

Re: The science behind on-the-wrist blood pressure tracking

#92

Post by dingensundso »

huhtenberg wrote: post #72
corry wrote: post #4

Actually, there is a wrist device called "Aktiia" that's approved for use for continuous BP monitoring with clinical accuracy by the UK and German health authorities (I believe). It's a bit of a pain to get over the pond, but with a shipment-forwarding company + a UK App Store account you can get up and running. I've dabbled a bit with it and it's very close to the cuff measurements. It works by calibrating with thei…

> Aktiia Looks interesting, but it too _ requires _ a cloud account to function. WTH.

Thanks for pointing that out. I would love to have regular automatic BP measurements but not with closed source software that demands an internet connection.

Re: The science behind on-the-wrist blood pressure tracking

#93

Post by AnonC »

brandonb wrote: post #31
mysterypie wrote: post #26

I'm hoping someone can answer a question that's been bugging me for years: When I take blood pressure medication my blood pressure goes down but my heart rate goes up [1]. That can't be good. Heart rate has a strong inverse correlation with lifespan, and this even holds across species (animals with higher heart rates have shorter lifespans). So does lowering blood pressure reduce the risk of heart disease, stroke, et…

This sounds like reflex tachycardia -- your body wants to ensure blood is flowing to all the right places, so it raises heart rate to partially compensate for blood pressure falling. Reflex tachycardia can be a normal response to certain types of blood pressure medications, like vasodilators or diuretics. Beta blockers are a different common type of blood pressure medication that attempt to lower both blood pressure…

I won’t be a user of your service, but wanted to share a bit of feedback on the page you shared. On that page, I didn’t see any definition for POTS (though I know what it is or if I were someone else, I could’ve searched online). The page mentions a CHOP protocol without a link or explanation about what it is. I think the page could do better with some simple explanations or at least a guidance on symptoms and what you offer. Currently it seems like it’s optimized to be linked for anyone searching for POTS, which probably assume a lot more than what most people may be aware of.

Re: The science behind on-the-wrist blood pressure tracking

#94

Post by AnonC »

mysterypie wrote: post #26

I'm hoping someone can answer a question that's been bugging me for years: When I take blood pressure medication my blood pressure goes down but my heart rate goes up [1]. That can't be good. Heart rate has a strong inverse correlation with lifespan, and this even holds across species (animals with higher heart rates have shorter lifespans). So does lowering blood pressure reduce the risk of heart disease, stroke, et…

> Heart rate has a strong inverse correlation with lifespan, and this even holds across species (animals with higher heart rates have shorter lifespans).

I’m not a doctor, but I don’t think this covers all cases. If someone has some kind of heart disease, they could have a lower resting heart rate and probably need medical attention and care. It may not imply that they’re going to live longer.

Re: The science behind on-the-wrist blood pressure tracking

#95

Post by smolder »

amelius wrote: post #89
smolder wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How specific events throughout the day affect your BP, like things you ate, caffeine, a walk in the cold/heat, exercise, or a conversation. I'd say it's all useful info for perspective on how to manage stress and circulatory health.

I can see how the information can be useful from a big-data perspective (finding correlations between the data of thousands of people), but for individuals I'm not convinced yet. For example, how do you know if a spike in BP is normal, or if it's only happening in your specific case and it needs attention?

I think the best answer to that is ask your doctor if you see something that concerns you. Though, even without an expert opinion or big data as a reference, establishing what is a baseline for yourself and then noting when there is significant deviation can have value. It could be an early warning sign or just encouragement to get help if your BP is one day very high or low. Some googling can probably give you an idea of what are normal ranges based on activity, too.

Re: The science behind on-the-wrist blood pressure tracking

#96

Post by msabalau »

amelius wrote: post #84
corry wrote: post #4

Actually, there is a wrist device called "Aktiia" that's approved for use for continuous BP monitoring with clinical accuracy by the UK and German health authorities (I believe). It's a bit of a pain to get over the pond, but with a shipment-forwarding company + a UK App Store account you can get up and running. I've dabbled a bit with it and it's very close to the cuff measurements. It works by calibrating with thei…

What extra useful information can you get from continuous BP measurement compared to once or twice daily measurement?

One real answer is "we don't know because this capability hasn't existed before" I mean, you can wear something like a traditional cuff that puffs itself up every five minutes or whatever, but that doesn't really fit into a patient/subjects life. Good like trying to recruit people for a long term longitudinal study.

But having worked in medical sensors, and spending time with researchers as customers, there was a real sense that they could learn a lot from BP readings that were accurate and continuous.

Re: The science behind on-the-wrist blood pressure tracking

#97

Post by No1 »

For anyone interested in on-the-wrist blood pressure tracking who doesn't want to spend the money on a Samsung Galaxy and hack SHMs, or wait for Apple to implement it, there are a plethora of Chinese smartwatches that already have the blood pressure monitoring and calibration capability that can be had for My experience with them is that although I wouldn't trust these to diagnose a medical condition, the trends are correct and correlate to cuff readings - they're not just random number generators.

I just wish there were a way to export the data from the H Band app. Apparently, the data is stored in SQLite files.

Re: The science behind on-the-wrist blood pressure tracking

#98

Post by corry »

sph wrote: post #62
corry wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100% hard agree. I'm now paying most attention to my overnight rate, like in the middle of the night - but even that takes a few hours to get down to the minimum value. Fascinating to see the big spike prior to waking up that signals your body is preparing for rising. Did I eat late before bed? Higher BP overnight. Drink any alcohol at all after, say, 12pm? Higher BP overnight. So it's still useful and interesting to…

The cause is actually known: high amounts of fructose or sugar (which is 50% fructose) -> decrease in nitric oxide production in the liver -> high BP Like many things, it is diet related. It seems "unknown" because GPs are still lagging well behind modern dietary research and are often nothing more than pill pushers. Lowering your sugar and simple carb intake over the long term, and fixing potentially hidden metaboli…

Hey I hear you, appreciate the perspective but I'm borderline keto most days -- almost zero sugar, very few carbs, etc -- and yet still here.

So while this may explain some amount (perhaps most?) of peoples idiopathic/essential HBP I doubt it's that simple.

"It's your potassium levels", "it's your homocysteine levels", "it's your fructose", "it's white-coat syndrome", "it's...." etc. Surely we're making progress but it's also not a silver bullet thing.

Good thing the treatments are so safe and effective.

Re: The science behind on-the-wrist blood pressure tracking

#99

Post by stareatgoats »

No1 wrote: post #97

For anyone interested in on-the-wrist blood pressure tracking who doesn't want to spend the money on a Samsung Galaxy and hack SHMs, or wait for Apple to implement it, there are a plethora of Chinese smartwatches that already have the blood pressure monitoring and calibration capability that can be had for My experience with them is that although I wouldn't trust these to diagnose a medical condition, the trends are…

> there are a plethora of Chinese smartwatches that already have the blood pressure monitoring and calibration capability that can be had for Sounds interesting. Any idea where can I find such, and additionally, how I can differentiate from the ones with fake claims?

Re: The science behind on-the-wrist blood pressure tracking

#100

Post by LorenPechtel »

corry wrote: post #51
LorenPechtel wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I found the exact reverse with the jog. One day I went into the mountains with a cuff on my wrist and took a bunch of measurements. I wasn't jogging but I had something like 25 pounds on my back and was definitely pushing myself. There was a huge effect from perceived temperature--while I didn't do the cold plunge I got some quite high readings when I was on the chilly side. Yet I could get low-normal readings with m…

Thanks for sharing. For me, I can see that DURING exercise, my blood pressure is quite raised but then drops down lower than usual in the hours that follow. However, I think that's more a function of resting HR - which remains elevated. My particular BP scenario is good diastolic, high systolic but low rest heart rate (low 50s). My pet theory is that my heart does fewer but stronger pumps, which increases the BP. Aft…

The *only* pattern I could find was it was inversely related to *perceived* temperature. The doc said that relationship was to be expected. My blood pressure would not be elevated even during the recovery period.
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