chaicka

amarkap said:

I don't mean to take away from the positive message of this story and I love my Apple Watch as much as the next person.  But in this case, I'm sure I would say it was the Apple Watch that saved this person's life.  Truth be told, he could have done the same with any at-home portable ECG device.  To be honest, I would say that fact that he was an anesthesiologist and his medical knowledge probably saved his life more than anything else.

Anyway, it is still a positive story and I'm happy he is on the road to good health...and no doubt the Apple Watch is an incredible device whose application far exceeds that of just setting alarms and knowing the time. 

I think you may have overlook a key point - "during a workout, an ECG is perform" at that exact moment in time. This is extremely useful and important. I have close buddy who suffered heart issue and went through surgery after months of inability for the doctors to diagnose what's wrong. It took the 5th attack of heavy heart pondering symptom which he was finally able to reach A&E within 15-20 mins while the symptom was still occurring for the medical team to finally pick up what is happening and acknowledge there is indeed a serious problem. He went for the first surgery within a short timeframe, and 1-2 months later, a second surgery (cause the doctor worries if his body can take both surgeries done at one go). Unfortunately, this happened before Watch Series 4 was even announced/available, and he was having Watch Series 3 back then.

To summarise, ECG is mostly only useful when done during symptom happens. This seems to be pretty common knowledge with doctors I have spoken to. Often than not, ECG done during normal times usually do not pick up many of the heart problems/diseases that ain't  having persistent/constant symptom.

lkrupp said:

My own cardiologist (a younger man) advises me to wear my Watch to bed. Bottom line is that doctors are beginning to realize the feature is not a useless marketing gimmick as some here have claimed in the past.

Indeed. I was one of those early adopters and in the past, doctors whom I have visited would sarcastically comment about wearing Watch. And when I shared on some occasions with the doctor on how my various long term spinal and neck related problems seem to have ease off after 6-12 months of wearing an Watch, they mostly gave me an attitude.

Fast forward to now, several years since Watch released, I am seeing more doctors giving due recognition and even making note of readings from my Watch (e.g. elevated resting heart rate during migraine attacks). It's definitely a welcome change in attitude from the medical care industries/services.

Ming-Chi Kuo has been pretty accurate in the past prior to his move to TF. After the move, it is still relatively accurate though not as 'shining' as prior the move.

I sure do not want a bloated OS to run across every single device in the ecosystem. And also, having a single OS to run across multiple type of devices is very difficult to have optimisations and granular fine tunings (e.g. logic or behaviour of WiFi on Apple Watch will be different from iPhone or iPad, due to antennas and other factors).

I have the Nomad ones (both types - with and without Apple Watch charging) but it has its own share of issue. More frequent than not, precise positioning of device is required, especially for AirPods and AirPods Pro. Lost count on occasions when my wife or myself thought the AirPods or AirPods Pro is charging but ended up not charged. After much observations, it seems the LED will light up initially but then it went off within a minute or two, and it did not charge up despite leaving it overnight, simply becoz the position is not quite right.

If Apple is to release the AirPower, I will definitely get at least one for home use, and just bring the Nomad to office.