Former Google exec Vic Gundotra shows off Kardia Band, an ECG heart monitor for Apple Watch [u]
The Kardia Band -- built by Google+ founding father Vic Gundotra's medical device startup AliveCor -- is an Apple Watch band with an integrated ECG module that the company hopes will make it easier for heart patients to identify potential problems before it's too late [updated].
Together with a companion iOS app, the Kardia band will help wearers quickly determine whether they should seek help when they feel unusual symptoms. The results of the sensor's analysis can be quickly e-mailed to a doctor if necessary, and users can attach voice memos to describe what they feel.
Update:
"AliveCor sits on the other side of the FDA line," Gundotra said to Re/code. "We are not a fitness product. This is not a toy. We're talking about people's lives."
The Kardia Band is a more portable version of the smartphone-connected Kardia Mobile, which is already approved by the FDA.
"We think it will become the first FDA-cleared accessory for any smartwatch device," Gundotra said. There is no word yet on how long that process might take, or how much the Kardia Band will cost when it does hit shelves.
Many believe that Apple initially planned to build more sensitive medical sensors into the Apple Watch, but scaled back plans to avoid the rigorous FDA approval process. Company executives went so far as to meet with agency representatives to discuss "mobile medical applications."
By opening up the Apple Watch to third-party developers, Apple can encourage the same types of uses without incurring the regulatory overhead.
Together with a companion iOS app, the Kardia band will help wearers quickly determine whether they should seek help when they feel unusual symptoms. The results of the sensor's analysis can be quickly e-mailed to a doctor if necessary, and users can attach voice memos to describe what they feel.
Update:
"AliveCor sits on the other side of the FDA line," Gundotra said to Re/code. "We are not a fitness product. This is not a toy. We're talking about people's lives."
The Kardia Band is a more portable version of the smartphone-connected Kardia Mobile, which is already approved by the FDA.
"We think it will become the first FDA-cleared accessory for any smartwatch device," Gundotra said. There is no word yet on how long that process might take, or how much the Kardia Band will cost when it does hit shelves.
Many believe that Apple initially planned to build more sensitive medical sensors into the Apple Watch, but scaled back plans to avoid the rigorous FDA approval process. Company executives went so far as to meet with agency representatives to discuss "mobile medical applications."
By opening up the Apple Watch to third-party developers, Apple can encourage the same types of uses without incurring the regulatory overhead.
Comments
Also, it's probably not white, but matte silver as in metal. Perhaps an electrode of some sort.
It has been 35+ years of trying to find non-invasive blood glucose monitoring systems.
no luck yet.
the results have always been poor. improving over the decades, but poor.
in comparison, NIRS and other non-invasive techniques has been refined to be very accurate and reproducible for measuring tissue oxygenation & a variety of other metabolic markers.
Glucose, however, has not had such luck.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26695247
Selection of the most informative near infrared spectroscopy wavebands for continuous glucose monitoring in human serum.
Another view of it, but with a white band rather than black.
EDIT: Looking at those images again I'm now wondering if the author used actual product shots or not. Thinking "not".
Maybe it doesn't need to be white but having it match the color of the band will make it more difficult for user to take EKG recordings. More info at http://store.alivecor.com/#kardia-mobile
If I was in the market for something like this, I'd worry about the 24 (borderline, 36-hour) hour battery limitation of the Watch, though. And the fact that charging is not possible when you're wearing it, which means that getting measurements/alerts when you're sleeping would be difficult, if not impossible.