In 2022, over 490 million wearable devices were shipped worldwide. Over the past seven years, shipments of wearable devices rose by a staggering 600%.
Despite its recent rise in popularity, wearable technology has been around for almost two decades. Fitbit trackers that can monitor the user’s heart rate first appeared in 2009.
In this article, you will learn from a company with digital health expertise about wearables in healthcare, the challenges that come with them, and which trends might be coming next.
Devices that track your vital signs and physical activity and then send this data to an app are called wearables. Connectivity technologies such as BLE, GPS, Wi-Fi, and cellular networks enable a data transfer link between your smartphone and a wearable.
Here are the technologies that form the wearables landscape today:
The most common wearable devices are:
All these technological advancements come with some benefits and challenges though, which we’ll discuss further below.
Three-quarters of people who use wearables say they are useful in tracking their vitals. Studies suggest that wearable technologies could help in fertility tracking, drug effects analysis, treatment of heat-related illness, and psychological interventions because they’re able to collect information frequently about what’s happening inside our bodies.
As the technology continues to evolve, wearable devices will likely have a positive impact on patient outcomes due to:
Wearables have great potential to improve the future of healthcare services.
If you plan to develop a healthcare solution based on wearables, you should be aware of its main challenges. The most prominent are security concerns, compatibility issues, poor infrastructure, and high costs.
Here are suggestions on how your organization can cope with some of those challenges:
In addition, hospitals should establish clear policies regarding how patients may access personal information stored on their devices during visits. It might include requiring visitors to sign agreements stating they will not upload photos onto social media websites while visiting patients’ rooms.
Despite current limitations for their implementation, wearable devices are already being used by many people worldwide. As wearables become more common over time, you’ll see them being used in hospitals and everyday life even more widely than today.
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