Additionally, the device will collaborate on a study with The Northwell Health's Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research to detect diseases in its employees.
The US Army Medical Research Unit awarded a $2.5 million award to this device, Fitbit. It is a smartwatch or smartwatch, capable of knowing initial stages of infection in users and in this way apply a test quickly and continue with prevention or quarantine measures in case of positive result.
“The combination of Feinstein Institutes’ research expertise, Northwell’s COVID-19 testing capabilities and Fitbit’s promising algorithm in development, presents a unique opportunity to accelerate early detection of COVID-19, particularly for our frontline health care workers,” explained Dr Karina Davidson, vice president of the Feinstein Institutes.
The company in charge of this device began in May to register participants for the study, in order to collect information from users over the age of 21 who had confirmed COVID-19 or symptoms of the disease.
In this way, after an analysis, the Fitbit device was shown to detect about 50% of COVID-19 cases a day before users reported symptoms. The most effective metrics when predicting the onset of infection are breathing rate, resting heart rate, and heart rate variability, usually monitored overnight.
In this way, through this technology it is possible to act faster on early detection in patients belonging to risk groups, and also helps to reduce the spread by detecting asymptomatic patients.
“Our research shows that our bodies start to fight the disease before more visible symptoms appear and we believe Fitbit can reliably detect these signals, giving us an incredible opportunity to get ahead of this virus and help alert people that they could be sick before they unknowingly spread it to others. This award will help advance this important research,” said Amy McDonough, CEO of Fitbit.
