Smart watches and fitness trackers can improve your health. It’s more than just counting steps – The Irish Times

From smart watches to fitness trackers to virtual reality headsets, the use of wearable technology has become commonplace in Ireland in recent years, with people incorporating it into many aspects of their lives.

People use smartwatches to track health information such as VO2 max (the amount of oxygen the body uses during intense exercise), resting heart rate, sleep patterns, and various other variables related to health and wellness. I am recording. This data is often used to understand and improve health, provide lifestyle guidance, etc.

However, for healthcare professionals and health systems, the increasing use of wearable devices that go beyond just counting steps and calories burned presents an exciting opportunity to improve health outcomes at the individual and population levels. Wearable technologies that are well integrated into health systems where data is interoperable—shared rather than siloed—will help us understand key factors that influence health at the population level. Because it can play a vital role and provide actionable insights to improve health and wellbeing.

On an individual level, they also offer the possibility of being part of the solution when the problem is treating and curing existing diseases, thus reducing the burden on already strained health services.

EY’s Future Consumer Index, which surveyed more than 22,000 global consumers, found that people are open to having their data tracked and regularly use tracking apps. Nearly half (46 percent) of survey respondents track their physical activity, nearly four in 10 (38 percent) track their heart rate, and a third (33 percent) track their calorie intake. , one in four (25 percent) said: They follow the meal plan created by the app.

Here in Ireland, there is a strong appetite for moving towards a digitally enabled health system and the sharing of health-related personal data, if it can be used in the right way to manage and improve health. Last summer, EY surveyed more than 1,000 people in Ireland as part of a global consumer health study. We found that 7 in 10 (72%) support automated electronic sharing of personal health information within the health system.

And while a similar majority (70%) are willing to share health information captured with wearable devices with clinicians, they are less likely to share biometric (78%), lifestyle (75%), or genetic information. I also found that they strongly agree with this. 67%) Data about the health care professionals who manage your care to improve your overall health.

Our national healthcare strategy, Sláintecare, focuses on delivering the right care, in the right place, at the right time. There are many challenges to overcome to ensure that data, analytics, artificial intelligence (AI), and wearable technology can support this strategy.

In terms of wearables, or any other emerging technology solution, part of the challenge is finding an integrated way to link data from individuals into the system, protect patient privacy and rights, and ensure patient safety. This is how to introduce wearable devices. Correct clinical supervision. Citizens can wear a blood pressure monitor 24 hours a day to guide the treatment of high blood pressure. However, because devices typically do not “talk” directly to the health information and communication technology (ICT) infrastructure, the data generated cannot be leveraged in real time or anything close to it. Instead, it must be downloaded, uploaded, and analyzed. This type of siled data is very common throughout healthcare systems with monitoring devices.

Currently, our health ICT infrastructure does not allow for the necessary flexible data sharing and ultimately the usefulness of health data. There are also gaps in the clinical education of health care professionals about how data and analytics can provide care to individuals and populations in need.

Demographic analysis powered by data from wearable technology makes it possible to stratify risks according to specific lifestyles and risk factors, and ‘give advice’ based on a data-driven personal health profile. In extreme cases, wearable devices could potentially save lives if they were able to detect critical incidents and alert appropriate clinical services.

Although its use around the world is still in its infancy, there is much promising research, including a small U.S. trial of the remote patient monitoring wearable BioStamp nPoint system, which provides accurate and reliable biometric monitoring in clinical and remote settings. It was suggested that possible data could be obtained. It was delivered.

Additionally, wearables allow younger generations to take charge of their own health in a very meaningful way, with significant long-term benefits.

Indicators detected by the device at a very early stage can generate personalized lifestyle advice and clinical interventions. Innovations like this are extremely important. We are combining an aging population with increasingly personalized care models. This means that healthcare delivery requirements will only increase in the coming years, and technology such as wearables can improve population health outcomes and healthcare delivery.

Integrating wearables with AI and generative AI opens up even more possibilities. While AI has been deployed in fields such as mammography for some time, generative AI can detect and explore new and more complex patterns in the output from wearables, apply them to different scenarios, and create new patterns between them. It may be possible to see if there is a correlation between . Incorporating data beyond pure diagnostics (e.g. lifestyle risk factors) into algorithms and combining them with, for example, mammography data will allow us to understand the likelihood of developing breast cancer much earlier, and therefore You can find out if you can intervene through your lifestyle and lifestyle. Other factors to best manage this risk.

Ireland’s healthcare leaders have the opportunity to build on previous advances and make the most of wearable data to reap the full benefits of the incredible technological advances we are seeing all around us. . Research shows that the health benefits at both the individual and population level are important for current and future generations, and now is the time to act.

• Dr Mary Coghlan leads Health Data and Analytics as a Partner at EY Ireland. She is a qualified physician, actuary, and analytics expert who helps organizations use advanced health analytics to support better health outcomes for their populations.