Should Your Watch Monitor Your Heart?
The new Apple Watch, unveiled yesterday in Cupertino, California, possesses a new and startling capability: It can monitor the electrical pulses that drive the heart’s activity, and proactively alert users who it has determined might have a condition called atrial fibrillation. The FDA has voiced its approval, Apple said, and the new product goes on sale this fall.
Reaction was predictably positive: Atrial fibrillation is the most common type of heart arrhythmia in the United States, and . The president of the American Heart Association graced the stage . “It won’t catch every instance of [atrial fibrillation], but we believe this is going to help a lot of people who didn’t otherwise know they had an issue,” said Apple COO Jeff Williams onstage of the feature, which is opt-in.
