Smartwatches are being used to detect changes in heart rate at rest, indicating that users are in the pre-symptomatic early stages of COVID-19.
CBS:
Devices such as the Apple Watch, Garmin and Fitbit watches can predict whether an individual is positive for COVID-19 even before he is symptomatic or whether the virus is detectable by testing, according to studies by leading medical and academic institutions, including Mount Sinai Health System in New York and Stanford University in California. Experts say that wearable technology can play a vital role in fighting the pandemic and other communicable diseases.
“Our goal was to use tools to identify infections at the time of infection or before people knew they were sick,” said Rob Hirten, assistant professor of medicine at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City and author of Warrior Watch study.
Specifically, the study looked at a metric called heart rate variability – the variation in time between each heartbeat – which is also a measure of how well a person’s immune system is functioning.
I am a slave to my Apple Watch.