How Apple Watch helps me monitor my COVID symptoms

[secretk]

So unfortunately for me I started feeling off this weekend and yesterday tested myself and it turns out that I have COVID.

I wanted to share how Apple Watch and Health app on my iPhone is helping me monitor my situation and my vitals. It is not my purpose to tell people that they should buy an Apple Watch because that’s personal decision but wanted to share insights on its usefulness. I doubt that my story is unique and I am sure that others can chime in and share their stories as well.

So Friday evening/Saturday morning I started to feel off. I had serious headache and issues with my upper sinuses. Also some upper back pain. I did not sleep well and my resting heart rate was elevated, my respiratory rate was also elevated. I also had sore throat and some low fever. It continues this way Sunday and as I have had cold/virus in my system and did not have increased heart rate and especially respiratory rate I decided to test myself and yep it was positive.

I have to take numerous different medications - fever handling, pain killers, vitamins, antibiotics, probiotics, anti blood coagulation (as I am prone to issues), sore throat stuff, nose drops and vitamins. Some of them multiple times a day. As you can manage it is not that easy to manage and remember all of that when you do not feel that well yourself. This is where this new Medication feature came in handy. I put everything there and now I am reminded when to take what. I also log there constantly my fever and thus can check trends. And naturally I also can monitor my heart rate, blood oxygen and respiratory rate. I also enter manually my blood pressure.

It definitely helps me to know what is going on and whether things are progressing well or going downwards. From what I read people initially would not get symptoms with decline with blood oxygen and respiratory rate. And once they feel them, they unfortunately need to be hospitalised. So having overview on this is really good.

Again not saying that just because of this everyone should buy an Apple Watch but decided to post because at least people that do own Apple Watch can take advantage of those perks.

 

[BenGoren]

So sorry to hear — and here’s wishing you a speedy recovery!

The  Watch is definitely a nice tool to have for when you’re not healthy, as well as to stay as healthy as possible in the first place.

To me, the lowest-hanging fruit in that regards right now would be for Apple to add the Health app to the Watch such that you could use the watch to “add new data” for things like oral temperature, blood pressure, weight, that sort of thing. Especially if it (conceptually) built off of the great things they did with the Medication app.

It’s really nice to get a reminder to take my vitamins with breakfast, or to be able to log that I took some ibuprofen in the middle of the night. Why not a similar reminder to weigh myself once a week, or to note my blood pressure when the nurse checks me in to a medical appointment?

b&

 

[secretk]

So sorry to hear — and here’s wishing you a speedy recovery!

Thank you! So far it is looking rather good. It is two days officially with the diagnosis and today I am already feeling better compared to yesterday.

The  Watch is definitely a nice tool to have for when you’re not healthy, as well as to stay as healthy as possible in the first place.

Yep, I bought it last year as I want to get into regular workouts. I might be biased and naive but I do think that this helped me fighting COVID as well. Setting daily goals kind kept me in touch and prompted to be far more regular in workouts. I know some people have elevated heart rate with COVID and even months after dealing with it. Well while I do have elevated heart rate (61 but this is high for me) my sedentary heart rate is actually not changed at all - average of 72 for the day. I do contribute this to working out actively every day for the last 8 months with having at least 1-2 workouts a week reaching anaerobic workout.

To me, the lowest-hanging fruit in that regards right now would be for Apple to add the Health app to the Watch such that you could use the watch to “add new data” for things like oral temperature, blood pressure, weight, that sort of thing. Especially if it (conceptually) built off of the great things they did with the Medication app.

That would be cool for sure.

It’s really nice to get a reminder to take my vitamins with breakfast, or to be able to log that I took some ibuprofen in the middle of the night. Why not a similar reminder to weigh myself once a week, or to note my blood pressure when the nurse checks me in to a medical appointment?

b&

Yes, good ideas indeed. Having the Health app accessible from the watch is definitely handy and useful.

 

[BuckeyeMamaw]

So unfortunately for me I started feeling off this weekend and yesterday tested myself and it turns out that I have COVID.

I wanted to share how Apple Watch and Health app on my iPhone is helping me monitor my situation and my vitals. It is not my purpose to tell people that they should buy an Apple Watch because that’s personal decision but wanted to share insights on its usefulness. I doubt that my story is unique and I am sure that others can chime in and share their stories as well.

So Friday evening/Saturday morning I started to feel off. I had serious headache and issues with my upper sinuses. Also some upper back pain. I did not sleep well and my resting heart rate was elevated, my respiratory rate was also elevated. I also had sore throat and some low fever. It continues this way Sunday and as I have had cold/virus in my system and did not have increased heart rate and especially respiratory rate I decided to test myself and yep it was positive.

I have to take numerous different medications - fever handling, pain killers, vitamins, antibiotics, probiotics, anti blood coagulation (as I am prone to issues), sore throat stuff, nose drops and vitamins. Some of them multiple times a day. As you can manage it is not that easy to manage and remember all of that when you do not feel that well yourself. This is where this new Medication feature came in handy. I put everything there and now I am reminded when to take what. I also log there constantly my fever and thus can check trends. And naturally I also can monitor my heart rate, blood oxygen and respiratory rate. I also enter manually my blood pressure.

It definitely helps me to know what is going on and whether things are progressing well or going downwards. From what I read people initially would not get symptoms with decline with blood oxygen and respiratory rate. And once they feel them, they unfortunately need to be hospitalised. So having overview on this is really good.

Again not saying that just because of this everyone should buy an Apple Watch but decided to post because at least people that do own Apple Watch can take advantage of those perks.

Sending good thoughts your way for a speedy recovery! 🙂

 

[secretk]

Sending good thoughts your way for a speedy recovery! 🙂

Thank you! I am already feeling much better.

 

[jwehman1]

I noticed that the wrist temperature (AW Series 8) was pretty good at verifying my sickness...not sure about "predicting" my sickness...but the wrist data tracked my (month-long cold/bronchitis) very well. It was rather cool to see the data (retrospectively).

 

[secretk]

I noticed that the wrist temperature (AW Series 8) was pretty good at verifying my sickness...not sure about "predicting" my sickness...but the wrist data tracked my (month-long cold/bronchitis) very well. It was rather cool to see the data (retrospectively).

Interesting! Thanks for sharing! I use Series 7 so do not have metrics for that . Do you feel better now?

 

[wes2006ag]

Ran some fever after a COVID booster and the watch picked up a 4.16 degree increase from my baseline so I guess that feature is working.

 

[GlenK]

Yes, I had covid and it helped my monitor mine too. I had it for 3 weeks and feel much better now. Fortunately after the first 2 days I had a fairly mild case. Fever went to normal after 2 days on Z-Pack and prednisone. Mostly chills, felt like I had a fever even when I didn't, metallic taste in my mouth, mild cough, and extreme fatigue. Never felt this tired and lazy in my life.
AW did help me monitor HR and blood Ox which stayed in the high 90s after the first couple days.

It was mostly like a bad cold and extremely annoying!! Felt like it was never going away!! Today I'm playing pickleball for the first time!!!

 

[secretk]

Yes, I had covid and it helped my monitor mine too.

Glad that it helped you.

I had it for 3 weeks and feel much better now. Fortunately after the first 2 days I had a fairly mild case. Fever went to normal after 2 days on Z-Pack and prednisone.

Cool that fever went away quickly. Same for me. It was just two days of fever.

Mostly chills, felt like I had a fever even when I didn't, metallic taste in my mouth, mild cough, and extreme fatigue. Never felt this tired and lazy in my life.

Ugh sucks that you felt so tired! So far no chills, but I did started having some mild dry cough in the 3rd day.

AW did help me monitor HR and blood Ox which stayed in the high 90s after the first couple days.

Good about the blood oxygen! Luckily mine never dropped.

It was mostly like a bad cold and extremely annoying!! Felt like it was never going away!! Today I'm playing pickleball for the first time!!!

Awesome! Congrats!

I started having light workouts since yesterday (3rd day with COVID). Nothing super strenuous - 13-14 minutes. Yesterday mostly 13 minutes in zone 2, today 15 minutes in zone 3 though I did reach for few seconds zone 4 pulse.

 

[GlenK]

^^Glad yours was so short and I feel fortunate too even though mine was three weeks. I have some friends who have been over covid for 5 to 6 weeks but still can't shake that cough and chilled feeling. For some people this thing just goes on and on!!!