Maeve O\u2019Neil, a 19-year-old freshman at George Washington University, knew she was sick \u2014 but had no idea just how dire it had become.<\/p>\n
It was seeing a dramatic spike in her respiratory rate, resting heart rate and body temperature through her device that gave her the courage to get it checked out \u2014 before it was too late.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt started around 3 a.m., while I was staying with my mom in a hotel after having been incredibly sick for six days,\u201d she recalled.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI woke up and instantly knew something was wrong. I couldn\u2019t fall back asleep, and worse, I couldn\u2019t even lie on my back because the pain was so intense. My first instinct was to check my Oura app, and what I saw honestly scared me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Maeve O\u2019Neil went to the emergency room after her Oura ring data \u201chonestly scared me.\u201d She soon found out she had Lemierre\u2019s syndrome, a rare, life-threatening condition. Maeve<\/p>\n
She was soon being rushed to the ER at George Washington Hospital, where she was immediately put on oxygen.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Numerous tests ensued. She was in respiratory failure, and was ultimately diagnosed with Lemierre\u2019s syndrome \u2014 a rare, life-threatening condition that usually starts with a bacterial throat infection like tonsillitis \u2014 as well as double pneumonia, septic emboli and COVID-19.<\/p>\n
Maeve spent seven days in the ICU fighting for her life, plus another ten on the infectious disease floor, where she ended up needing thoracic surgery to place tubes on her lungs to allow them to heal.\u00a0<\/p>\n
She\u2019s made a great recovery, and now, five months on, she\u2019s thriving \u2014 and a Division I lacrosse player \u2014 but it may not have turned out this way.<\/p>\n
She had originally bought the Oura ring simply to take her health a bit more seriously, and she liked the goals it presented. But it did more for her than she could have ever imagined.<\/p>\n
\u201cI keep thinking about how different things could\u2019ve been if I hadn\u2019t checked my Oura data that night,\u201d she said. \u201cWithout it, I probably wouldn\u2019t have gone to the ER when I did \u2014 and I might not be here to tell this story.\u201d<\/p>\n
Maeve, a Division I lacrosse player, spent seven days in the ICU. Maeve<\/p>\n
\u201cI keep thinking about how different things could\u2019ve been if I hadn\u2019t checked my Oura data that night,\u201d she said. Maeve<\/p>\n
What can trackers actually do?<\/p>\n
It\u2019s now estimated a third of Americans are using some form of activity tracker or smart wearable.<\/p>\n
Increasingly often, that\u2019s led to stories of users learning about serious health conditions \u2014 thanks to a digital nudge from their ring or watch. There have been multiple accounts of people getting diagnoses<\/a> for lymphoma<\/a> \u2014 as well as conditions like lupus and AFib \u2014 after wearable metrics convinced them to see a doctor.<\/p>\n But while some consumer health trackers include FDA-cleared features \u2014 such as atrial fibrillation detection on newer Apple watches, Fitbits, Samsung Galaxy smartwatches and the Withings ScanWatch \u2014 the brands all warn that they are not diagnostic tools designed to identify illness.\u00a0<\/p>\n Wearable health trackers aren\u2019t meant to diagnose anything, but they can provide valuable information. Tamara Beckwith\/NY Post<\/p>\n \u201cOura Ring is not a medical device and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, monitor, or prevent medical conditions or illnesses,\u201d the brand previously told The Post.\u00a0<\/p>\n What they can increasingly do, though, is provide people with cold hard data on things like heart rate, skin temperature and sleep patterns when something feels wrong, triggering the wearer to see a medical professional for a crucial diagnosis.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWearables are becoming the rearview mirror and the windshield of personal health,\u201d said Dr. Jordan Shlain, the founder of Private Medical. \u201cThey show you where you\u2019ve been and, increasingly, where you might be heading.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhen someone notices their resting heart rate has been creeping up for three weeks, or their sleep architecture has quietly collapsed, that\u2019s not a gadget being clever. That\u2019s pattern recognition at a scale no human could track on their own. The real power is in the baseline. Once you know your normal, you can spot your abnormal.\u201d<\/p>\n That\u2019s not to say they are the be all and end all, though.<\/p>\n \u201cA wearable can tell you something is off. It cannot tell you what is off, or why,\u201d added Shlain, who has concierge practices across the US.\u00a0<\/p>\n Nicolette Amette\u2019s Fitbit alerted her to problems with her resting heart rate and prompted her to get tests done. She ended up needing heart surgery. Nicolette Amette<\/p>\n \u201cData without context is just noise. A heart rate spike could be atrial fibrillation or it could be the espresso you had at 3 p.m. We are still in the early innings of this technology, and right now these devices are collecting puzzle pieces without being able to see the full picture.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n For many, though, even those pieces have been enough to try and discover why they have not been feeling right.<\/p>\n Saving a lot of heartache<\/p>\n At 44, Nicolette Amette, a London-based TV producer, had her diagnosis off the back of a Fitbit finding.\u00a0<\/p>\n By day she\u2019d been feeling dizzy and out of sorts; by night her heart was racing. Her husband had seen her constant fatigue and loss of zest for life. It was only when she started wearing the Fitbit and seeing her resting heart rate was about 120 bpm, sometimes reaching over 140 bpm, that she knew something really wasn\u2019t right.\u00a0<\/p>\n She felt so ill one morning that she took herself to the hospital, armed with the data that showed her heart rate circling between 200 and 220 bpm.<\/p>\n An EKG revealed a combination of heart issues: atrioventricular nodal reentry tachycardia (AVNRT), atrial fibrillation (AF) and tachycardia, causing these fast and irregular heartbeats.\u00a0<\/p>\n Her issues included atrioventricular nodal reentry tachycardia (AVNRT), atrial fibrillation (AF) and tachycardia.\u00a0 Nicolette Amette<\/p>\n In addition to her wearable, she now also carries a small EKG sensor called a KardiaMobile, which can be attached to her phone. Nicolette Amette<\/p>\n Amette ended up needing heart surgery later that year, followed by two further operations.\u00a0<\/p>\n She relied on her wearable through treatment. She also carries a KardiaMobile device with her, a small EKG sensor that can be attached to the back of your phone, which some doctors recommend following a heart diagnosis.\u00a0<\/p>\n On the path to diagnosis<\/p>\n Not every health tracker discovery is a matter of life and death.\u00a0<\/p>\n Sandy Mendez, a 33-year-old from Houston, Texas, had originally bought an UltraHuman ring to track her sleep because she always felt tired. But its period-tracking function was what pinged a problem.<\/p>\n \u201cMy ring kept flagging my cycle every month,\u201d she said. \u201cA few months showed ovulation, but most months did not.\u201d<\/p>\n That led her to a doctor\u2019s office, where tests identified fluctuations between an overactive and an underactive thyroid.\u00a0<\/p>\n She now feels she has an explanation for her exhaustion, as well as the palpitations she\u2019d been having. Crucially, she said, it gave her \u201cthe confidence to advocate for myself and seek medical answers.\u201d<\/p>\n Sandy Mendez\u2019s life wasn\u2019t in danger, but she does credit learning about her thyroid problems from her Ultrahuman ring. Sandy Mendez<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think I would have discovered my thyroid issue if it weren\u2019t for the Ultrahuman ring,\u201d she said. She also hopes that she and her husband are a step closer to their dream of starting a family.<\/p>\n Health trackers have allowed users to monitor themselves like never before, and many with chronic conditions are being encouraged by their doctors to keep track this way, rather than just waiting for check-ups.<\/p>\n But while rings and watches may offer a safety net, doctors still caution against waiting for an app to tell you to see an MD.\u00a0<\/p>\n Dr. Shlain, for one, believes them to be a staple of how we will protect and monitor our health in future \u2014\u00a0but it won\u2019t happen until they can be \u201cbe genuinely predictive, not just reactive,\u201d integrating things like genetics and history.<\/p>\n \u201cA sensor on your wrist will never look you in the eye and ask the question you didn\u2019t know needed asking. That is what a doctor does,\u201d he said. \u201cTechnology should make the doctor better, not make the doctor optional.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Maeve O\u2019Neil, a 19-year-old freshman at George Washington University, knew she was sick \u2014 but had no idea…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":515193,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[3281,186,40470,97,1244,252,253,1492,9447,172,37383],"class_list":["post-515192","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health-care","tag-doctors","tag-exclusive","tag-fitbit","tag-health","tag-health-and-wellness-products","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare","tag-heart-disease","tag-hospitals","tag-tech","tag-wearable-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515192","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=515192"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515192\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/515193"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=515192"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=515192"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=515192"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}