Asking Doctor Mike About Fitness Wearables

By
09rupeshraj4@gmail.com
-
47
33


Doctor Mike stopped by to discuss all things health in tech! In this clip, Marques and Andrew ask him about his thoughts on fitness wearables and whether or not they’re actually useful.

Doctor Mike Youtube Channel:

Watch full episode:

Shop the merch:

Twitters:
Waveform:
Marques:
Andrew:
David Imel:
Adam:
Ellis:

Instagram:

TikTok:

Join the Discord:

Music by 20syl:

Waveform is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

source

47 Comments

  5. 12:30 does operating at a higher level of “health” contribute to increased life expectancy? Of course there are specific values we’ve measured having an impact on life expectancy, does being in the higher percentile of these measurements show additional life expectancy increase?

  7. My grandmother had her first heart attack when she was only 22. She never had any high tech fitness tracker to watch her resting heart beats and any option to occasionally do ECG. She went on to study political science at the Lincoln's University of Science and Arts and she started playing squash there. You all know how squash can increase heartbeat. She couldn't become good at this tough and she ended up marrying her coach who was aged 52 at that time who would regularly check his heartbeats manually with touching wrist and trusty analog watch and occasionally by putting two fingers on his neck like a detective searching for clues. This was the action thag impressed my grandmother actually as she was always worried abut her heartbeat and the then coach would often touch her to check and tell her heartbeats rate. Both had my eldest aunt and then my two uncles and then my father. And they passed on their love for sports to him.

    He on the other hand choose to study medicine and became a doctor at the age of 24 years old. He is the first one in our family to start using a fitness tracker. And he would bench press everyday. The fitness tracker on his wrist looked like a Gi Joe secret bracelet looking control center strapped to a human arm, with more computing power than the first moon landing spacecraft. It would beep and buzz and calculate things that nobody in our family had ever thought about calculating before. Like how many steps it takes to walk from the living room to the refrigerator, or how many calories are burned while arguing with your mother-in-law.

    My father would wake up at 5 AM, his fitness tracker already judging his sleep quality before he could even open his eyes. "Look," he would say, showing me the graph that looked more complicated than his medical diagnosis charts, "I only moved 17 times during the night. That's peak efficiency!" I would look at him, wondering if efficiency was something one should aspire to while sleeping. The tracker knew more about his body than he knew about himself. It would tell him when to breathe, when to move, when to stand, when to sit – it was like having a miniature drill sergeant wrapped around your wrist.

    During family dinners, he would compare his daily step count with the enthusiasm of a sports commentator. "I did 12,534 steps today!" he would announce, while my mother would roll her eyes and continue serving her legendary lasagna. The fitness tracker didn't care about lasagna. It only cared about metrics, about numbers, about proving that human bodies could be reduced to mathematical equations and perfectly plotted graphs.

    My grandfather, the 52-year-old squash coach, would look at this device with a mixture of suspicion and fascination. He had survived decades without knowing his exact heart rate or step count, having relied solely on the ancient technology of human intuition and occasional pulse-checking. "In my time," he would say, adjusting his reading glasses, "we didn't need a computer to tell us we were alive. We just knew."

    But secretly, I think he was impressed. Impressed that technology had reached a point where a small device could track more health metrics than an entire hospital could in the 1960s. A device that could potentially have prevented my grandmother's heart attack, that could have warned her about the risks of playing aggressive squash with a heart that was more temperamental than a teenager's mood swings.

    The fitness tracker became more than just a device in our family. It became a center of attention, it became an identify of our family, a conversation starter, a source of endless jokes and mockery. "Did you know," my father would say, pulling up another graph, "that I burn exactly 73 calories during my morning coffee?" We would laugh, but we would also listen. Because beneath the jokes and the numbers, there was a simple truth: this little device represented hope. Hope that we could understand our bodies better, that we could prevent the health surprises that had haunted our family for generations.

    So here's to you, fitness tracker. You might not be perfect, you might drive us crazy with your constant beeping and measuring, but you're watching over us. And sometimes, that's all we need. So you most defiantly get an Apple Watch if you have an iPhone or if you have an android, get a xaiomi band. I bought my first Mi band when it used to be black and white. Not the world used to be black and white, I’m talking about the watch screen used to be black and white. When I was a kid like 5-6 years old, I asked my uncle why some films are black and white. He told me 100 years ago everything was black and white. And I believed him. No master want people say to you, get a fitness watch. Because once my aunt say one lady fainted and fall down on the side walk. My aunt had a fitness watch in her hand. She remembered if she fell like this, the watch would have automatically called 911 so she using her intelligence, called 911 herself. But in my country the emergency is 999 not 911. So after few try she finally realized the problem and took her phone and called ambulance. That is how a fitness band can save your life also. There’s another time one mafia came to my uncles shop and asked for extortion money which is around 20K USD. And the mafia leader cinematically said to my uncle there’s no change you can run away from this. My uncle said what if u do my ecg and show to you. The mafia being old-fashioned and uneducated, challenged my uncle there’s no chance you can do an ecg now as I’ll not let you leave. My uncle in panic, laughingly used his smart fitness band and show the ecg report. That day tvis watch saved his life too.
    My while family is greatful to fitness bands. Please get one.

  11. There’s a study showing STEMI tracings matching on both a 3 lead apple watch ECG and 12 lead in the ED. The study said adjustments to the software could even get you a 6 lead. That alone was enough for me to get one! This information would only really be helpful to a trained medical professional though.

  13. Some can say the same about doctors and medication. Pills and drugs that are sold are just bandaid to treat symptoms. Not the root cause of the problem which would cure you. Then not need further medication.

  15. Really like that they pointed out the difference between fitness and health tracking. I track my workouts since years and I really like to see my progress. But all the health stuff is really strange – especially if when now hiw unreliable the data is. Totally get the health anxiety stuff

  19. The future in something like neuralink and global network of connectivity 😅 no government big company controls the web just like sci-fi 😂 and health data always available on the cloud and memories too. 🙄 No need of external device no smart phone or watch needed nothing to remember either 😐 healthcare professional just need to access your data from the cloud. 😁

  23. I definitely feel that my wearable is more entertainment than usefull – mainly because I don't have a health problem that needs tracking and I'm happy to just keep my BMI below the obesity level. I consistently get 5 hours or less sleep but there's not a whole lot to do about that so having that information logged isn't helping.

    The most interesting data I've gathered so far is the gigantic difference in physical effort different jobs have.

    I'm currently re-educating myself to get a desk job and in the meantime I've got a part time job driving a truck and packing goods in a warehouse – 8 hours of standing up but mostly standing still. First semester I gained weight at an alarming rate and got a cheap Mibro fit watch, struggling to close circles and whatnot.

    Over the summer I went back to my old job as a cleaning lady for that sweet full-time vacation cover cash flow. Suddenly I was doing 1.5 weeks worth of exercise every. single. day. No shit I gained weight when I went sedentary, for 7 years I had to cram myself full of calories just to get through the day and I hadn't changed those habits anywhere near enough for my activity levels.

    These days I do not even bother logging my workouts in the watch, I just do my 30 minutes of daily exercise and try to walk more often when the opportunity arise. The watch is more useful as an alarm clock, because at work I need to be alerted 5 minutes in advance that my break is coming up so I can park the truck and clock out.

  25. I don't use my health gadget (an older Fitbit) for too much, but I've found that it helps me lose weight. Coordinating calorie counting with the gadget/app estimate of my calorie usage based on heart rate/activity has been really helpful.

    I don't know if the calorie usage estimate is correct, but it has been correct enough to be useful and encourage me.

  29. Thank you so much for this amazing video! I have a quick question: I have a SafePal wallet with USDT, and I have the seed phrase. (alarm fetch churn bridge exercise tape speak race clerk couch crater letter). How should I go about transferring them to Binance?

  41. Aren't fitness trackers just a way to buy off your responsibilities? Exercise regularly or move daily. Avoid alcohol and drugs, go to bed on time, and eat your fruits and vegetables—all without needing a health tracker. On the other hand: live unhealthily and don't care at all, your smartwatch will alert you in time if you're about to have a heart attack. Yet another example of solving the problem instead of preventing it.

  43. Doctors can be just as painful as they find patients. If you go and see them the minute you detect a problem, you’re over anxious. If you wait several weeks or dismiss something entirely, you should have seen them sooner. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.

  55. Not a good video to post with only one person's opinion on these watches. They should have had several others including those supporting the technology. He comes across as the only authority on the topic. Not worth sharing.

  59. I had a loop recorder in my chest for 3yrs to capture data on a heart concern. Never had an incident during the 3yrs. 6 months after the loop recorder was removed, I had symptoms. Used the ECG on the Apple Watch to record the incident. Cardiologist used the data to diagnose the issue as ectopic heartbeats. Now I know what to do when it happens (which is rarely). Positive outcome for me

  63. I am using a Fitbit but only for counting steps, track time in the gym and heart rate during workout and calculate calories burned and the notifications for my calendar. The other stuff just came with it.

  65. I have found it to be an extra piece of motivation in the early stages of a new exercise routine, when it is hardest to keep it up. At least for me, my resting heart rate decreases way before any noticeable physical changes.

  69. These devices are generally great! My Apple Watch has gotten me into a very active lifestyle where I am always moving and stadning up trying to close the rings. It also helps me track my workouts (especially runs) super easily.

  73. My Apple Watch alerted I had heart rate 30bpm . My radial pulse was irregular and slow. I went to A&E was admitted ECG showed ventricular ectopics I was also hypertensive. I was admitted to hospital for 6 days had CT cardiac angiogram now on medication. UK cardiologist recommended wearing these watches/devices this doctor isn’t up to speed re these devices. People have reported they have felt unwell but the watch alert so they went to A&E.

  77. PSA: a Health and Wellness device, which are most smart watches, CANNOT be used for medical diagnosis, it is NOT a medical device. Medical devices are heavily regulated by the FDA and a smart watch is not such a device. This means it can give you a lot of data, but no doctor will use this data to do any diagnosis, they will use actual medical devices to do so. As Dr. Mike said, the data is considered “for entertainment” purposes only. – from someone who designs medical devices for a living.

  81. Listening to these guys only confirms that they have no idea of what they are doing.
    When Steve Jobs was alive, Apple had a vision. Now, Apple is just another corporate entity.

  85. I must be honest, I disagree with Dr Mike. When I monitor my fitness and dieting activity, I tend to stick to it. It’s something about tracking that reminds you about your goal

Leave A Reply

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here