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Apple Watch Series 6 Rumors: Blood Oxygen Tracking, Performance Improvements, Faster WiFi and More

Did anyone else read the second half of the title as "Bug fixes and performance improvements"? What if Apple wrote press releases the same way app developers write release notes? :)
 
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nordique said:
The oxygen sat is a big sales gimmick. Very little actual medical benefit to be gained. It’s a neat feature, might be helpful for chronic COPD patients on home O2 or something. For everyone else it’s a feature that is nice and will have significant advertising behind it, but in practical medical terms much less useful than a heart rate sensor or ecg

I think non medical people doesn’t understand how little an O2 sat monitor tells you outside of acute settings, that the advertising is really going to be a big thing here
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Tell that to my 76 year old father who has to monitor his O2 sat levels constantly each day. There are many people whom this feature would benefit a heck of a lot more than the “always on” watch face, which was pretty much the only difference between the 4 and the 5.
 
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My grandmother is an Asthama patient, It would be nice if apple provides an O2 monitor, and away allow developers to access it so that I can get information about her O2 level, also a notification if the level drops below a given level.
 
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When I had Covid I was given one of those finger oxygen readers first thing by the hospital to check myself every day I was in quarantine and report it to the nurses daily. If it dropped to a certain number I was to go to the er.
 
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Blood oxygen tracking? Sounds great but the reality is, my Apple watch 4 performs questionably at the most basic tracking (heart-rate measurement). Sometimes when I feel really fast heart-rate (exercising for example) the watch is showing me 50bpm and needs ridiculously long to show proper numbers. Considering how much commercial Apple made about their sophisticated heart sensor, i'm not impressed.

Edit: I have to add, Runkeeper seems to utilize sensor better then native heart-rate measuring app on the watch, so maybe it's just a specific software thing.
 
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I rarely post, but just wanted to say thanks to you and the other few Docs here for sharing your expertise.

I'm a fitness junkie and immediately got excited over the hype since I train daily.


bernoulli said:
As an anaesthesiologist, I would have to disagree with that statement. Oxygen saturation does not gauge fitness or lung performance. Well, not in the way you are thinking. If your oxygen saturation is below 95% regardless of any setting may indicate there could potentially be pathological VQ mismatch.

To gauge performance then you would be looking at more like vo2 max which could actually be estimated using the heart rate ratio without any need of pulse oximetry;
VO2 max ~ hr max/hr rest x 15.3 mls/kg/min
There are also other ways of estimating VO2 max.

Other things one could look at are things like aerobic or anaerobic threshold.
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nitramluap said:
Agree - also an Anaesthesiologist ;)

For a really accurate VO2max you need to be measuring actual oxygen consumption and it requires quite a bit of complicated kit & a standardised testing protocol. The estimated VO2max is good enough.

I think detecting undiagnosed sleep apnoea will be how they angle the marketing (and maybe high altitude sports/aviation)... but not as a general health tool. Apple's usually pretty sensible in this regard - they don't claim anything which can't be backed up with evidence which is so refreshing to see in the tech world.
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I agree and believe pulse oximetry for sleep apnea would be one of the the only few reasonable use I could think of which will benefit the general public.
 
The WOPR said:
I rarely post, but just wanted to say thanks to you and the other few Docs here for sharing your expertise.

I'm a fitness junkie and immediately got excited over the hype since I train daily.
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I think it’s good to get excited about device having new things incorporated which we would never have dreamed of 20 years ago. However, it’s also healthy to get informed decisions/choices and have realistic expectations on how the device works and what it is able to do
 
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incoherent_1 said:
Responses like this are why these forums are so great.

Well, that, and the snarky jokes.

Thank you for relaying your expertise in a way even goons like me who skipped physical science classes in college can understand. :)
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No, thank you for engaging in positive way. Whenever I make any suggestions on reddit, people assume they know better and try to discredit basic sciences :(
 
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Theyayarealivin said:
Are we getting the watch next week???
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Based on inventory status at local stores you would think that a new model is coming but the levels are probably down due to the COVID19 who knows?

I have the 3 GPS but wanted to goto GPS + Cellular so I figured maybe the 5 or they have the 3 in GPS + Cellular.
 
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I've ditched mine now since I don't have an iPhone any more, but they really need to work on the general speed of the interface in my opinion - especially for third party apps.

In demos and some first party apps, actions like opening/navigating are instant. In the majority of Apple Watch apps, especially those that rely on their iPhone counterparts, they're dog slow and it's not uncommon to see 5-10s opening times.
 
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nordique said:
Again, it doesn’t tell you anything significant

By the time you have a significantly changed A-a gradient or VQ mismatch from a viral related exacerbation, you’ll already be in the hospital with O2 monitors

The lungs work a little differently with pathology than the heart does especially with serious illnesses. With the heart there is a lot more “silent” pathophysiolgy. With the lungs, not so much.

You can bet Apple’s advertising will let people think they need it though especially during a pandemic lol. Non medical people don’t quite understand how oxygen saturation tells pathology and how, more or less, useless it is outside of a hospital.
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From what I understand from my Fitbit Ionic, Fitbit gauges your amount of fluctuation of blood O2 levels as you sleep (see attached photo). High levels of variation might indicate a problem (sleep apnea, for example). And in the current COVID19 era, I would think that seeing high level O2 fluctuation would be very helpful as an early warning of a problem, knowing that some COVID patients are not even aware of low O2 levels.
 

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gizmogirl8919 said:
is it worth upgrading from watch series 3 to the Series 6?
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I upgraded from the S2 to S5. There were differences in speed and screen size. Everything else was minor.

Do you work out 3-4 times a week? Do you need the ECG, fall detection, or rumored blood/oxygen features? If yes to any of these then I would upgrade. A 3 year cycle seems good.

If your Apple Watch is more of a fashion accessory or lifestyle device, I would use the watch until they stop releasing wOS updates for your particular series. (wOS 7 likely will be the last update for the series 3 so you could always try to wait it out another year)
 
tridley68 said:
Will be upgrading my series 4.
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If these reports are true, I likely will too.

I have severe asthma, and use a pulse oximeter when I’m feeling borderline (after acute meds), to help me decide when/whether to go to the ER. It’s not the only factor, but it’s another piece of information. It’s also helpful info for my pulmonologist, she says.

Having one on my wrist would be worth the upgrade.
 
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From an Australian perspective, I wont be upgrading to this watch for the blood oxygen feature, which would be nice to use, as we are still waiting for ECG. I wont upgrade my watch at all actually until Apple starts pushing for some of these features they advertise to be accepted by Australian Medical. Why are some of these features available in Australia in other watches?? Pathetic Apple.
 
The original series 0 watch had the hardware for O2 levels and they weren't enabled.
 
I still wish they would go back and finish the half baked sport side of the apple watch. This is just another bunch of features with minor usefulness and a major price tag.
 
burtba said:
From an Australian perspective, I wont be upgrading to this watch for the blood oxygen feature, which would be nice to use, as we are still waiting for ECG. I wont upgrade my watch at all actually until Apple starts pushing for some of these features they advertise to be accepted by Australian Medical. Why are some of these features available in Australia in other watches?? Pathetic Apple.
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Not sure how you make the assumption that Apple are pathetic. We have one of the toughest regulatory bodies in the world, and we often don't ever get therapeutics that other nations have approved. The TGA and Standards Australia are tough. Take for example bicycle helmets, we often to wait 18 months after the European model goes on sale for the AUS/NS standard to be approved.
The Oximeter function will get through easily, as it's already on other devices.
 
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I was diagnosed with apoenea a couple years ago, got a cpap used it until I lost 35 pounds and stopped. With the watch I could have some real-time data wherein I wear my cpap on alternate nights to see what I see. That saves a lot of $$ over having my docs do it . What day some of the wonderful MDs who have shared their knowledge so generously here?
 
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