Are you taking advantage of it? Increasing number of patients receiving “smartwatch outpatient care”… “25% are asymptomatic” Early detection of malignant arrhythmia is also possible.

It is very difficult to catch an “arrhythmia” that occurs only once a month or once every six months…

A convenient smartwatch that allows you to check your email, calls, and other notifications at your fingertips. Many business people may find them useful for health management, as they can measure heart rate, activity level, and even sleep status. In this environment, the number of people who seek medical care after receiving a notification from their smartwatches is rapidly increasing. Smartwatch outpatient clinics are beginning to be established at general hospitals and other facilities as a way to accommodate this trend.

The Apple Watch, one of the most popular smartwatches, can measure heart rate and electrocardiograms with high precision. In 2008, Apple’s electrocardiogram application, the Home Electrocardiograph Program, and the Home Heart Rate Monitor Program, which notifies the user of irregular heartbeats, were approved as home medical devices by the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare.

Since that time, the number of patients who said they were alerted of an irregular heartbeat has gradually increased. We thought that many of them might not know which department to go to, so we opened the ‘Smart Watch Outpatient Clinic’ in the Department of Cardiology, which treats arrhythmia, in the summer of 2011.

Dr. Yukako Takimura of the Department of Cardiovascular Medicine at General Tokyo Hospital is in charge of the Smart Watch Outpatient Clinic. At the smartwatch outpatient clinic, a specialist in arrhythmias is in charge of diagnosis.

The Apple Watch alerts us when there is a possibility of atrial fibrillation, which is a malignant arrhythmia, or when the pulse is too fast or too slow. There are several types of arrhythmias, and atrial fibrillation is one of them. To diagnose it, it is necessary to check the ECG at the time the arrhythmia occurs.

If a patient goes to the hospital saying, “I had palpitations yesterday,” but the EKG is normal at the time, the doctor cannot diagnose arrhythmia. On the other hand, even if an arrhythmia is latent, it may be overlooked if there is no problem during the annual physical examination.

Not being diagnosed means that treatment cannot be started early. In this regard, the smartwatch, which is always worn, makes it possible to measure arrhythmia-related symptoms such as palpitations and shortness of breath, not only when they occur, but also when there are no symptoms.

Patients who come to the Smartwatch Outpatient Clinic already have a record of arrhythmia caught ‘red-handed’. This speeds up the process from diagnosis to treatment. It is very difficult to catch an arrhythmia that occurs only once a month or once every six months, but having the ECG on file at the time of the visit helps us as doctors.