Wearable technology has come a long way from the early purpose of
fitness tracking and has many uses in healthcare. There used to be a
lot of talk about fitness trackers, smartwatches, and health monitors,
which were focused on keeping us updated on our activities, heart
rate, and sleep patterns. Yet, as technology has progressed, these
gadgets have gained a lot of newer sensors and algorithms to be able
to take and process health information besides exercise data. This
trend is part of an increasingly clear sense of wearables’ role in
health and wellness.
This new healthcare application of wearables mainly focuses on
monitoring patients and treating chronic diseases. Fitness wearables
that monitor heart rate, blood pressure, glucose, and more can track
all this data in real-time and improve the lives of patients. Because
these devices enable remote monitoring, doctors can get involved
earlier and avoid problems before they’re too severe. Such a
capability is especially relevant for the management of chronic
illnesses, where current data will guide treatment decisions and
ensure compliance with care.
This article will talk about some of the newest uses of wearable
technology in healthcare that don’t just involve fitness. We will
review recent developments in patient tracking and chronic disease
management to show you how wearables are changing the healthcare
landscape. This article, which includes case studies and examples of
successful deployments, will show how wearable technology can
transform patient care health and help providers provide tailored,
data-driven treatments to patients.
The wearable industry took off in the late 20th century with simple
fitness monitors. There were simple pedometers and heart rate monitors
that would tell users how fit they were in the early days. With the
invention of smartphones and the development of sensors, more advanced
machines could be made. Fitness trackers — for example, Fitbit —
entered their own market in 2009, when wearables flooded the market,
with users looking to track their health at their fingertips. This
consumer appetite created the pretext for future wearable technology.
As wearable devices became more capable, the era of fitness trackers
becoming medical instruments started to evolve. Firms saw the
opportunities in wearables not only for fitness but also for chronic
health monitoring and clinical interventions. That change was made
possible by advances in sensor technology, data science, and
connectivity so that the devices could take vital health measurements
such as blood glucose, ECG, and blood pressure. Regulations like the
FDA also approved wearables for medical purposes, opening a whole new
class of wearables for monitoring patients and chronic disease
management. It was an evolution that gave healthcare professionals the
ability to make wearables part of their everyday patient care.
We now see wearables in healthcare more often due to trends like
remote patient monitoring and personalized medicine. With telehealth
and the shift to more patient-centric care, wearables are being used
to capture real-time health information to communicate with healthcare
providers. Innovating biosensors, artificial intelligence-based data
analytics, and medical-specific wearable devices are the future. As
medical groups take up the baton, the promise of wearables in terms of
reducing mortality, disease, and clinical workflow is only increasing,
and wearables for healthcare are paving the way forward.
Wearable devices are a game-changer for long-term health monitoring by
allowing you to monitor your heartrate, blood pressure, and blood
glucose in real-time. These sensors can gather health information and
send it to the clinician or device on demand so they can intervene
early and make a more informed decision. Smartwatches and fitness
bands, for example, are able to track your heartrate and activity
levels throughout the day, while wearables such as CGMs, designed for
diabetes patients, monitor your glucose levels in real-time. This
monitoring is particularly useful to chronically ill patients, who get
crucial information about their health and can be managed proactively.
Here are a few case studies on how wearables can help you monitor your
patients in real-time. An obvious candidate is continuous glucose
monitors (CGMs), including the Dexcom G6, which will keep track of a
person’s blood glucose using a miniature sensor attached to their
skin. Not only does this device help people with diabetes regulate
their diabetes more effectively, but it also sends signals of high or
low blood sugar to intervene and correct them right away. A third
possibility is to use ECG monitors, such as Apple Watch Series 4 and
later, that have an ECG app that lets you do an electrocardiogram at
any time. Such monitors can spot irregular heartbeats, which provides
patients and medical personnel with data that can be used to intervene
in time and potentially prevent fatal cardiovascular events.
Health analytics and telemonitoring platforms are key to unlocking the
full promise of wearable technology in healthcare. Healthcare
providers can better understand patients' health patterns and outcomes
by sifting and consolidating data from different wearable devices.
Machine-learning algorithms can spot patterns in the data to give you
predictive analytics to help you get an early start and customize your
treatment. Most remote patient monitoring solutions also integrate
with EHRs to give providers real-time access to data and historical
patient data. This coordination creates a more holistic patient health
experience, ultimately increasing patient participation, outcomes, and
cost-effective healthcare with timely interventions.
Wearable technology can help to manage chronic diseases like diabetes,
cardiovascular diseases, and respiratory disease by giving the patient
and health care provider constant real-time information about their
condition. Wearable instruments such as continuous glucose monitors
(CGMs), for example, are a must for diabetics to measure their blood
sugar throughout the day and adjust their insulin therapy accordingly.
The same is true of wearables with heartrate and ECG functions that
assist people with heart disease in monitoring their symptoms by
monitoring heart rate and advising them when something is amiss. In
respiratory illnesses, a wearable that measures oxygen saturation can
deliver data that could support patients’ symptoms and regimens.
Components of wearables specifically for chronic disease management
include reminders for medications, symptom monitoring, and
connectivity to telehealth. There are many wearable devices that have
notifications to remind patients to take their pills in time and stick
to their treatment plan. There’s also symptom tracking so that
patients can document their experiences, including pain or respiratory
symptoms, to inform clinicians for better decisions. Some wearables
even integrate with telehealth services for live, virtual
consultations that let clinicians monitor patients’ information and
tailor treatments to their patients in real-time so they can help
without going to the person.
Both patients and physicians can benefit from wearables. Wearables
help patients with treatment compliance as they can receive support
and live updates on their condition, making it easier to manage
chronic disease alone. This kind of instant feedback enables patients
to make better health decisions and is responsible. Wearables make
early intervention possible for physicians as they can spot alarming
patterns in patient health data. It can also avoid complications,
hospitalizations, and overall health issues, which will result in more
efficient and effective chronic disease management.
The collaboration between wearables and EHRs (electronic health
records) and other healthcare IT systems is essential for providing a
full picture of patient health. With wearable data in play, doctors
can learn more about the patient’s routine health, monitor changes
over time, and determine the appropriate treatment regimens
accordingly. This integration creates a better patient experience in
which wearable data from real-time can be combined with historical
health records for better patient engagement and diagnoses. It also
helps clinicians to track chronic conditions better so they can
intervene in time and minimize complications.
But while it’s important, it’s extremely difficult to make wearable
devices and healthcare systems work together on data interoperability.
Manufacturers also tend to utilize different data formats and
standards, so it’s difficult to share data across them all. What’s
more, data privacy and security concerns can slow the ability of
healthcare organizations to adopt these technologies. These issues are
overcome through the industry's development of more and more standard
protocols and data exchange frameworks like Fast Healthcare
Interoperability Resources (FHIR). Efforts between technology
developers, clinicians, and regulators are needed to build regulations
that can lead to safe and effective data integration at the lowest
possible cost to both providers and patients.
A few services can link wearables and physicians to exchange data to
enter health data into EHR. For example, platforms such as Apple
Health and Google Fit pull health data from different wearables and
pass it on to clinicians via secured APIs. Telehealth platforms like
Teladoc and Amwell usually integrate wearable data, so doctors can
access patient data in real-time when meeting remotely. These
platforms aren’t only better communication tools between patients and
providers, but they help patients play a greater role in their own
care, which in turn means improved outcomes and an improved healthcare
system.
The issue of privacy and security should be on top when it comes to
wearable tech in medicine. They can even hold personal health
information that can be accessed or hacked by mistake. For instance,
patients might not want to wearables because they believe their health
data may be divulged or misappropriated. Manufacturers must have
strict security to deal with these concerns — encryption, safe
storage, and tight password protection. What’s more, physicians and
patients need to be informed about how to protect patient health
information, build trust in wearable technology, and encourage its use
in clinical practice.
A third problem relates to the reliability of data. Even with wearable
devices making great strides, their data is not always good data, as
the design of the device, algorithms that read data, and the user’s
attention to usage policies are all factors that influence how well
they perform. For example, inaccurate heart rate or glucose values can
lead to erroneous medical choices that can be unsafe for the patient.
To reduce this, clinicians need to confirm the data that they receive
from wearables with clinical norms and train patients on how to
properly use their devices. More research and development are also
required to make wearables more accurate and trustworthy.
Finally, wearable devices need to be regulatory compliant and
standardized to ensure their healthcare use is safe and effective.
Regulation agencies like the FDA need to have specific regulations on
the approval and tracking of wearable devices – especially ones that
transmit medical-grade information. Standardisation in data formats
and protocols of interoperability are also needed to integrate with
existing healthcare infrastructure and drive adoption. Together,
manufacturers, regulators and healthcare professionals can develop a
more aligned system that facilitates responsible wearable use to
further patient care and health.
Wearable trends promise to change the healthcare industry with advanced technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning. These technologies will also allow wearables to deliver health information according to user data, making customized recommendations for lifestyle modifications, medication use and symptomatic care. AI algorithms can, for instance, take wearable data patterns and see which areas are vulnerable to illness before they have a chance to intervene. And with smart sensors coming in to make wearables better able to track more health parameters, including water intake, stress levels, and sleep, this also will allow patients to own their health as well. We can expect some significant wearables changes to patient care for the foreseeable future. Future developments could include more advanced wearables that perform a few different tasks at once, for example fitness trackers coupled with glucose monitoring and heart-health monitoring. Wearables could also become telehealth tools where patients can talk directly to doctors through the wearable. Such could result in the provision of proactive care arrangements in which clinicians would be able to track patients in real-time, modify treatments as live data changes, and have virtual consultations via the wearable. These advances can improve health through continuous interaction between patients and healthcare providers. Telehealth and remote monitoring along with wearable devices will play a key part in healthcare delivery in the future. As telehealth becomes more prevalent, wearables will help physicians maximize the value of remote visits by giving health professionals insight into patients’ health state based on data being received directly from their device. This alignment will lead not only to better care accessibility but also more accurate and rapid interventions. Wearables will be critical tools in retaining patients, adhering to treatment regimens, and keeping patient and clinician communication seamless as healthcare becomes a hybrid of in-person and remote care – creating a more patient-centric healthcare system.
In conclusion, wearables are rapidly evolving from their initial fitness applications to a part of patient care and chronic disease monitoring. The new devices provide real-time health data, help patients take control of their own health, and make for proactive, individualised care plans. While technology continues to revolutionize wearables’ capabilities, AI, telehealth, and data analytics will also change how healthcare is delivered. Taking up these innovations contributes to not just better patient care but a more connected and effective healthcare infrastructure, which in turn changes the way we manage our health in our everyday lives.