Devices & Diagnostics, Hospitals

Can doctors actually keep up with the wearables market to make it worth your while?

So you are being proactive about your health by purchasing wearable devices and apps, but […]

So you are being proactive about your health by purchasing wearable devices and apps, but how helpful is it really if your doctor isn’t up to speed with the technology or able to interpret the data?

The wearables market is doing quite well currently. “Credit Suisse estimates it’s already worth between $3 billion and $5 billion,” NPR reports. “Add to that nearly 50,000 health apps, and you have a booming new digital health industry aiming to transform health care in the same way Amazon took on publishing.”

Dr. Paul Abramson, a primary care doctor in San Francisco told NPR that as much as these new devices are promoting good health generally, it’s not necessarily practical for doctors to interpret all of the data.

“Going through it and trying to analyze and extract meaning from it was not really feasible,” he says. “I get information from watching people’s body language, tics and tone of voice. Subtleties you just can’t get from a Fitbit or some kind of health app.”

Part of the issue is that FitBits and Apple Watches aren’t regulated by the FDA – they are considered “low-risk devices” and don’t require approval because they aren’t used for diagnosis or treatment. For that reason, it’s challenging for doctors to treat the data like valid information.

Dr. Michael Blum, a cardiologist at the University of California, San Francisco says, “We can’t make the leap that just because the data from these low-risk devices is coming in digitally doesn’t mean that it’s accurate.” He says validation studies are needed, which means doctors and hospitals have to get more involved.

Blum is now heading a new department at UCSF to look at which technologies are particularly helpful with healthcare and which are duds.

Obviously wearables and health-related apps won’t hurt as you keep your health in mind, but the information you receive might end up being gibberish or simply not of interest to your doctor. We’ll see how that could change in the years to come.

[Photo from Flickr user Heidi Forbes Öste]

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