FDA Gives Nod to Apple Watch EKG Reader Accessory

The KardiaBand allows users to take EKG readings in order to distinguish between normal sinus heart rhythms and atrial fibrillation (A-fib), the most common type of serious heart arrhythmia, which can lead to strokes or other heart-related problems.

The KardiaBand can record an EKG in just 30 seconds. The user simply touches an integrated sensor, and the results are then displayed on the face of the Apple Watch.

AliveCor also announced the release of SmartRhythm, a new feature in the Kardia app. It relies on artificial intelligence to monitor a user’s heart rate and determine the correlation between heart activity and physical activity. It can detect when a user’s heart rate and activity are out of sync and promptly send an alert.

“KardiaBand paired with SmartRhythm technology will be life-changing for people who are serious about heart health,” said Vic Gundotra, CEO of AliveCor. Gundotra previously helmed Google+.

“These capabilities will allow people to easily and discreetly check their heart rhythms when they may be abnormal, capturing essential information to help doctors identify the issue and inform a clear path of care to help manage A-fib, a leading cause of stroke, and other serious conditions,” he added.

KardiaBand, which is now available for US$199, works in conjunction with AliveCor’s Premium $99 a year subscription service. The combined system provides subscribers with SmartRhythm notifications on Apple Watch, unlimited EKG recordings, and automatic detection of A-fib or normal sinus rhythms.

Users can email unlimited EKG readings to anyone, including a doctor, and are provided with unlimited cloud access to all EKG readings, along with weight and medication tracking. All of this data is mailed to users in a monthly paper report with full readings from the device.

Heart of the Matter
Although AliveCor’s KardiaBand is the first EKG device available for the Apple Watch, it is just a small part of Apple’s fitness-monitoring efforts.

The company recently announced its Apple Heart Study app, the first research study to utilize Apple Watch’s heart rate sensor to collect data on A-fib. Apple partnered with Stanford Medicine to perform that research.

Smartwatches could become increasingly useful to help

“There are millions of people with frequent or infrequent heart arrhythmia who could benefit from a band like KardiaBand,” said Roger Entner, principal analyst at Recon Analytics.

“It would help diagnosis and speed up treatment in cases where and when it occurs, and it would certainly be a driver for people who have heart arrhythmia, which is often a side effect of diabetes and other heart disease,” he told TechNewsWorld.