A smartwatch or wearable fitness tracker can help you take control of your health by providing valuable insights, but is all that data useful to your physician? Maybe — to a point. Kevin Moore, MD, family medicine physician at CHI Saint Joseph Medical Group – Primary Care in Bardstown, says the information you glean from a wearable device may draw your provider’s attention to something worth investigating, especially if it concerns you. However, traditional, evidence-based data is necessary for a proper diagnosis.
“A smartwatch that tracks your pulse and may occasionally show something unusual can create a conversation and start a workup,” Dr. Moore said. “I think these devices are useful. Like many physicians, I’m still determining how to incorporate the information these devices provide because their use has grown so rapidly, but I think they can help us move patients toward healthiness.”
A version of this article originally appeared in the Fall 2021 print edition of Spirit of Health.
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