Google reveals new health tracking wearable for medical professionals

Google has announced a new wearable, intended to give doctors and researchers quick and accurate data on their patients. The new wearable can measure a patient’s skin temperature, heart rhythm, and pulse. It’s also able to track environmental data, such as noise and light exposure, Bloomberg says.

The wearable isn’t going to available to the public. In fact, it’ll primarily be a prescription-based device. “Our intended use is for this to become a medical device that’s prescribed to patients or used for clinical trials,” says Andy Conrad, head of the life and sciences team at Google.

Google’s new wearable isn’t ready for medical facilities just yet, though. The search giant plans on collaborating with officials in the medical field to test the accuracy of the data the device provides. The wearable hasn’t received approval in the United States or Europe yet, either. But, Google does plan to begin trials with the new device this summer, which means it could be ready to go as early as late 2015, pending government approval.

If found successful, the device could prove to change how doctors and researchers gather data in the medical field. Slapping a wearable on a patient’s wrist would be much easier than current methods. But, there is one big hurdle that has to be worked on before facilities can even begin to think of adopting this new technology: unreliable patients.

“Historically, doctors do everything — patients just need to turn up at the trial site,” said Dennis. “Now, we’re asking patients to take on meaningful responsibility in gathering information.” As Bloomberg points out, asking patients to keep the device charged hurts data severely because you just don’t know if a patient will comply or remember. Not to mention that they’d need to keep the device on their wrist as opposed to taking it off.

I look forward to the day when this sort of technology is widely adopted, though. It would make it a lot easier to catch things before they happen, such as heart attacks and maybe sometime in the future, even strokes. If a simple wearable could detect or warn you when there’s heart irregularities or a blood clot forming somewhere, many potential harmful situations could be averted before they even happen.

Would you wear a device like this?

Source: Bloomberg

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