Tag: fitness tracker

Wearable technology benefits become evident to doctors and patients, alike

| October 19, 2015

There are some considerable advantages to wearables and they are becoming increasingly obvious.

With all the different DIY monitors and devices that patients have to use at home – which now include wearable technology in many different forms – the shape of the relationship between doctors and patients is starting to change, as is the care available from doctors and the care patients can provide themselves.

Blood pressure and glucose monitors, fitness bands, and other devices make tracking easier.

Wearable technology has pushed this trend forward very quickly, as wristbands and smartwatches offer sensors that can perform functions such as heartbeat and blood pressure tracking, sleep tracking, activity tracking and a range of other capabilities. Not only is it giving patients the ability to better understand the functions of their body systems, over time, but according to Yale University medical professor, Stephen Huot, doctors are already starting to see the benefits of the use of these wearables.

This helps to explain why so many people are using wearable technology and why this trend is growing.

Wearable Technology - Doctor and PatientIn 2012, Pew Research Center conducted a nationwide survey that determined that even by that time, 69 percent of adults were monitoring at least one indicator of health and wellness. These included diet, weight or exercise. Among them, 21 percent said that they were using a form of technology to be able to track that particular indicator. That said, Pew now projects that as weareables become more readily available, it will skyrocket in popularity, to the point that people will be commonly using wearable or even embedded devices by 2025.

Pew also explained in the report on its research that among the survey participants, 46 percent felt that their behaviors in tracking their health indicator(s) had altered their overall approach to a healthful lifestyle or toward someone else for whom they were providing care. Furthermore 40 percent of the survey participants said that the data they had collected by tracking had driven them to pose new and different questions to their doctors, or had even encouraged them to obtain a second opinion.

For this reason, doctors are increasingly prescribing the use of wearable technology, particularly for monitoring certain chronic conditions, such as patients with diabetes.

Wearable technology and GPS help athletes perform at their best

| September 29, 2015

A growing number of teams are finding that wearables are also helping to reduce the risk of injury.

Only three years ago, before wearable technology was as commonplace in the form of fitness trackers, it wasn’t uncommon for teams to use large, complex machinery to attempt to understand an athlete’s movements and habits in order to prevent injury and boost performance.

This was the case at the University of Toronto, where the varsity team had been using “what looked like a lab tool.”

This, according to engineer Rami Nabel, who was a student at the time and was weight training when he saw the tracking equipment used to try to track and analyze the performance of the varsity team. Nabel explained that the device that was used “was really intricate. There was a tripod, a display screen and a big box on the ground, with lots of wires everywhere.” Nowadays, though, wearable technology is accomplishing many of the same goals as that lab-style equipment, but in a much simpler way and at a much lower cost.

Nabel is now the founder and CEO of a fitness tracking wearable technology company called Push Inc.

Wearable Technology - athletesPush is enabled by smartphones and is based on an armband that the athlete wears in order to be able to track and analyze various different factors throughout strength training. The device s currently being used by more than 25 professional teams around the globe and, according to Nabel, “we’re growing in the college and amateur market as well.”

This plays into a rapidly growing trend that is using wearables to help to measure performance, and the companies that are grabbing hold of a part of this trend are finding that they can make a place for themselves relatively quickly at the moment, simply because the market has yet to reach its saturation point.

According to the Canadian City of Hamilton’s business development manager, Norm Schleehanhn, “We see performance analytics as an area ripe for growth.” In July, that city announced that the surrounding area would be focusing on this field in order to become a center of excellence within performance and wearable technology. “Tech companies can take advantage of our excellent sports facilities, world-renowned health networks and post-secondary institutions to create useful partnerships.”