There are plenty of reasons to consider buying a smartwatch, from their design features to the ways they can influence your productivity. A new report suggests that Apple Watches could be particularly helpful to cardiovascular patients recuperating at home — and could, perhaps, even take the place of some medical appointments.
At Engadget, J. Fingas has news on a recent study conducted by Stanford researchers and financially backed by Apple. Titled “Activity data from wearables as an indicator of functional capacity in patients with cardiovascular disease,” the study featured 110 participants, who used Apple Watches running an app called VascTrac. Over the course of 6 months, these patients took weekly 6-minute walk tests (aka “6MWT”). This data was compared with similar data on such tests conducted within the clinic.
Based on this study, it sounds like conducting these tests at home could be in the future of many doctors. Among the study’s conclusions? “[P]assive activity data acquired by an iPhone and Apple Watch were an accurate predictor of in-clinic 6MWT performance.”
The Engadget article points out that WatchOS7 includes a 6-minute walk test feature, meaning that the app used in this study may not be necessary for much longer. It’s an interesting spin on the ways fitness and technology can converge.
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