As American Heart Month continues, Apple has a poignant story to share about how an Apple Watch birthday present probably saved the life of a 58-year-old man named Bob March.
In a letter addressed to a medical team performing a cardiac procedure on Bob, he thanked the team who performed the operation and cited the Apple Watch for taking him to the operating table in the first place.
Unlike many of his patients, I had no idea that fate would bring us together today. On Friday, after a five-kilometer run with my dog, I went to Providence for a checkup, as I had noticed that my pulse was too high on the Apple Watch my wife game for her birthday. After a standard electrocardiogram, 10 minutes later I was in an ambulance and coming here. The rest of my journey is now in your capable hands.
The heart procedure took place last fall, shortly after Lori March presented her husband Bob with the Apple Watch for her 17th birthday. It didn’t take long for the Apple Watch to become an invaluable purchase:
Bob, a former college-level athlete who also ran half marathons as an adult, immediately started exploring his new Apple Watch. He discovered the Heart Rate app, and although he was relaxed, his first reading showed 127 beats per minute. That was loud for Bob, but he dismissed it as a fluke.
“I thought, ‘this is crazy,'” said Bob. “If I was starting to run, or getting cold, I would definitely be reaching numbers like that.”
It turns out that an arrhythmia was straining Bob’s heart and, if left untreated, could be the cause of a stroke. Fortunately, a cardiac ablation procedure corrected the health problem, but only because the symptoms were first signaled by the Apple Watch in time.
In the years since Apple launched the Apple Watch and invested in its health monitoring capabilities, we have seen countless stories like these that describe how devastating results have been avoided.
Read more about Bob’s story here and learn how Apple Watch is saving lives in our Apple health guide.
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