Apple Heart Study Ends for Some Early Participants Ahead of January Completion Date

[mcgroarty]

Mine ended today, 97 days in.

Come on, it's not that hard to analyze hearth rhythm with the current sensor. Sure, it's not EKG (that I hope will be added soon), but can be a great tool for an early alert so you go and visit your doctor.

The current mechanism takes very infrequent measurements. They are minutes aspart unless a reading is triggered through manual interaction. I suspect measuring properly would need a sensor mechanism with better power efficiency in order to sample multiple times per minute. The events it’s looking for may only last a few seconds.

 

[JackieInCo]

At the end of the survey, it asks if you would be willing to participate further if it becomes a possibility. I said yes.

 

[Aston441]

Impedance matching is fascinating stuff. It's well-understood for electronic circuits, but there's little awareness of the applicability of the model in mechanical systems (especially biological systems). In his book Scale, Professor Geoffrey West discusses the application of an impedance model to our arterial network. You can see part of the discussion from the book here. He's primarily talking about the geometry of the branching of arteries, but the frequency-dependent behavior of the heart over time -- the focus of this study -- is a critical component. West also discusses why Tesla's AC design for power grids was superior tech -- Edison's DC design would never scale.

I highly recommend this book/ebook.

Edison's early design ideas maybe. But DC scales better than AC today.

https://www.powermag.com/a-new-record-for-the-longest-transmission-link/

I despise AC. It's legacy we're stuck with now unfortunately probably forever. I dream of a DC only world.

 

[usarioclave]

Not sure the heart sensor works all that well for people with heart murmur. I was jogging at 165 then all of a sudden it reported 85. I think not.

I look through my heart data occasionally, and there do seem to be a lot of odd readings. What studies like this will hopefully help determine is how likely is it that those odd readings are bad readings or real measurements of weird heart activity.

I would expect that the AW should, if it gets a reading it thinks is "odd", take a few more readings quickly to see what happens. That's usually what happens in real life when you get something out of the expected range

 

[neoelectronaut]

Is it awful that I was hoping we'd be offered the chance to buy an exclusive Apple Watch Band or something for our participation?

 

[Threbus]

Got the completed message yesterday.
[doublepost=1535997832][/doublepost]

It does that for lots of people especially when you are moving around. When it does that the lower number is usually about half of the actual rate I have found.

...or vice versa - my wife will have notifications of a high HR which is approximately double her resting rate with no change in activity, level of consciousness, or development of pain. Only lasts a second or two, so I think it's just a sensor issue.
[doublepost=1536022585][/doublepost]I was in the study 278 days, my wife for 123 - both of us were notified that the study had completed.

 

[sirozha]

Did the survey contain question about the slow heart rate? About if you are on any medication that slows down heart rate? About if you take aspirin or other blood thinners?

I noticed that my heart rate is lower than I thought. I wonder if these questions were tailored to each individual situation or if these were standard questions that everyone got.

 

[glenthompson]

I had 1,549 samples over 278 days. Joined on 11/30/2017.

 

[FloatingBones]

Edison's early design ideas maybe. But DC scales better than AC today.

https://www.powermag.com/a-new-record-for-the-longest-transmission-link/

Um, no. That's talking about a high-voltage DC point-to-point connection. It's flipped to/from AC on both ends. Read the article you cited: "It consists of two 3,150-MW HVDC converter stations placed at either end of the line: at hydropower plants at Porto Velho in northwest Brazil and in the southeast near São Paulo (Figure 2). ABB also delivered an 800-MW HVDC 'back-to-back' station that transmits power to the alternating current (AC) network in the northwest of Brazil."

Nobody is using a network of DC lines for the power grid proper. No transformation from a DC high-voltage transmission lines to lower-voltage DC distribution lines. It doesn't work. West spells out why in Scale -- it doesn't scale.

I despise AC. It's legacy we're stuck with now unfortunately probably forever. I dream of a DC only world.

As long as electricity is distributed through a grid, your dream is a nightmare. Power distribution from big generation facilities can only work in an AC world -- even in Brazil. Impedance matching is crucial.

Interestingly, our mammal circulatory network winds up being essentially DC at the capillaries -- the oscillations of our heartbeats winds up to zero at that tiny scale. That is also covered in West's book. If you wished to rectify your power from the electric company and be DC-only at your house, that would be fine. I think the engineering is fine; you may or may not run into some building code violations. Or just put a bunch of USB-capable outlets in your house -- run as much as possible off of USB.

Your "correction" ends up making my point: people have no intuitive sense whatsoever for electrical or mechanical systems that have stored energy -- and must be modeled with impedance. Understanding why the model is required and how it is applied has pretty well been beyond our comprehension. That's why I was so damn grateful that this book came out. Great thinking -- great concepts to learn.

 

[mentaluproar]

So, do I just delete it now?

 

[Jax44]

Got the notification. 2175 contributions over 272 days.

 

[TheSourceOfTruth]

I predict Apple will have a service called iHeart.

 

[Elijen]

Had 5-6 times a day the elevated heart rate message for weeks, went to doctor and he didn’t take it seriously, cause with his EKG at that appointment everything showed up as fine.
[doublepost=1536012859][/doublepost]
When I’m at the gym this also happens sometimes and I’m confused.

Some doctors just don't give a ****. I have arrhythmia/heart palpitations quite frequently but not always. Of coarse I didn't have any when I went to the doctor so he said I am fine and sent me home. I'll go and insist on EKG where they observe you for longer periods of time (also while doing exercise etc.) soon.

I am sure 99% of strokes and heart attacks could be prevented if people/doctors paid more attention to the symptoms.
[doublepost=1536062247][/doublepost]

The reason they don't is because they need data first. It's surprising, but the medical field really doesn't have a lot of data on "normal" because the data was really hard, if not impossible, to get. What are people's normal heart rate? What if you're really big? Really small? They have no idea, for the most part.

Heart rates vary, but heart rhythm is always the same for healthy heart. We not only know how exactly does healthy heart rhythm looks like but we also know how exactly some of the specific diseases look like.

I am not talking about medical grade equipment. Just a metric or an alert that could help you catch some of the symptoms earlier so you can go and get a proper EKG.

And sure, there are reasons why Apple didn't do it yet. Some of them might be technical (like battery usage or sensor accuracy) and some of them regulations that do not allow you to show people some of their vitals because then it counts as a medical device. (We know that the Apple Watch sensor is capable of measuring much more than just heart rate, but Apple refused to disclose the specifics).

 

[bflowers]

I'm complete, but the End Survey wouldn't load for me.

 

[PlayUltimate]

I received the study complete message as well but I would not say that I enrolled early. I did not join the study until February 2018.

ditto.

 

[iMerik]

Did the survey contain question about the slow heart rate? About if you are on any medication that slows down heart rate? About if you take aspirin or other blood thinners?

I noticed that my heart rate is lower than I thought. I wonder if these questions were tailored to each individual situation or if these were standard questions that everyone got.

If I remember correctly, I believe the survey did ask questions similar to what you listed.

 

[Threbus]

Did the survey contain question about the slow heart rate? About if you are on any medication that slows down heart rate? About if you take aspirin or other blood thinners?

I noticed that my heart rate is lower than I thought. I wonder if these questions were tailored to each individual situation or if these were standard questions that everyone got.

I think they're standard questions.
[doublepost=1536083776][/doublepost]

Some doctors just don't give a ****. I have arrhythmia/heart palpitations quite frequently but not always. Of coarse I didn't have any when I went to the doctor so he said I am fine and sent me home. I'll go and insist on EKG where they observe you for longer periods of time (also while doing exercise etc.) soon.

I am sure 99% of strokes and heart attacks could be prevented if people/doctors paid more attention to the symptoms.
[doublepost=1536062247][/doublepost]
Heart rates vary, but heart rhythm is always the same for healthy heart. We not only know how exactly does healthy heart rhythm looks like but we also know how exactly some of the specific diseases look like.

I am not talking about medical grade equipment. Just a metric or an alert that could help you catch some of the symptoms earlier so you can go and get a proper EKG.

And sure, there are reasons why Apple didn't do it yet. Some of them might be technical (like battery usage or sensor accuracy) and some of them regulations that do not allow you to show people some of their vitals because then it counts as a medical device. (We know that the Apple Watch sensor is capable of measuring much more than just heart rate, but Apple refused to disclose the specifics).

It could simply be sensor inaccuracy, not an actual elevation of the heart rate. Especially if the watch can move around on your wrist. Check to see if the indicated HR is a multiple or division of your HR immediately before or after. If it's double or half, I would suspect sensor or software glitch rather than actual arrhythmias. What you need to worry about is a prolonged (greater than 6 seconds or so) episode of very high (<200) or very low (>40) HR along with symptoms like dizziness or light-headedness, especially with chest pain or pressure.

 

[Janschi]

Some doctors just don't give a ****. I have arrhythmia/heart palpitations quite frequently but not always. Of coarse I didn't have any when I went to the doctor so he said I am fine and sent me home. I'll go and insist on EKG where they observe you for longer periods of time (also while doing exercise etc.) soon.

I am sure 99% of strokes and heart attacks could be prevented if people/doctors paid more attention to the symptoms..

Currently I don't have any of those issues anymore, thanks god.

It could simply be sensor inaccuracy, not an actual elevation of the heart rate. Especially if the watch can move around on your wrist. Check to see if the indicated HR is a multiple or division of your HR immediately before or after. If it's double or half, I would suspect sensor or software glitch rather than actual arrhythmias. What you need to worry about is a prolonged (greater than 6 seconds or so) episode of very high (<200) or very low (>40) HR along with symptoms like dizziness or light-headedness, especially with chest pain or pressure.

I don't think mine were due to sensor inaccuracy. I actually felt like **** when it showed that message and I couldn't sit, or stand. The only thing that was "feeling good" was laying and taking naps. Couldn't do that most of the times.
I didnt have a HR over 200 that time I definitely felt a little bit dizzy, but I had pressure in the chest/belly area.
Thanks god, I don't have these problems right now anymore.

 

[chelsel]

I was not expecting this, and I have to say my anxiety went way up when I got a notification from the Apple ❤️ Study app! I was glad to see they were ending the study, and glad that I wasn't having a cardiac event!

 

[joshwenke]

The reason they don't is because they need data first. It's surprising, but the medical field really doesn't have a lot of data on "normal" because the data was really hard, if not impossible, to get. What are people's normal heart rate? What if you're really big? Really small? They have no idea, for the most part.

I'll bet it's unclear how accurate the sensors are, because to do that you have to compare your data against a known standard, and there isn't one. Do you really want to walk around with a nurse all day calibrating your sensor against a manually-measured value?

And even though the data from all these sensors is an amazing trove of data, but even you still need to correlate it.

The good thing is Apple and its partners are starting to do that.

Great explanation, @usarioclave. Thanks for sharing.

 

[catwoman4000]

I signed up for the Apple Heart Study in November, 2017 and received my notice that the study had ended. They took 1206 heart rhythm data contributions over 217 days. I was more than happy to volunteer for this study. I appreciated the information received on my iWatch series 3 concerning the heart rhythms over this time period. I am thinking about the Series 4 iWatch with the enhanced heart rhythm info. Any thoughts pro or con from other participants??