It is often recommended that features on our smartwatches, like the ECG tool built into the Apple Watch, should not be used to replace actual professional medical equipment. This means that you shouldn’t 100% rely on the readings to self-diagnose, but rather you could take the readings as a sign that you should get yourself checked out.In what seems like a twist, a report from the European Heart Journal revealed a case involving an 80-year old woman who actually had to use her readings from her Apple Watch to prove to doctors that she did indeed have a heart problem, an issue that apparently a traditional ECG monitor did not show any evidence of.
However, after doctors reviewed the readings from her watch, they were ultimately able to diagnose her and identify the issue where she underwent surgery to fix it.
According to the doctors, “The development of smart technologies paves the way for new diagnostic possibilities. In the case of the Apple watch, after the mobile application is installed, the records an ECG when a finger is placed on the watch’s digital crown. A 30-s tracing is stored in a PDF file that can be retrieved from the application. Thus, the Apple watch may be used not only to detect atrial fibrillation or atrioventricular-conduction disturbances but also to detect myocardial ischaemia.”
Filed in . Read more about Apple Watch, Health, Smartwatch, Social Hit and Wearable Tech. Source: imore