Dr. Giovanni Ferrara, MD

Smartwatch Monitoring

for Respiratory Diseases

Participants with respiratory disease experience often a worsening of their condition, with increasing symptoms such as cough and shortness of breath. This worsening, often called exacerbation or flare up, impacts on the life of the participants, since they become limited in their daily activities. Healthcare is still based today on limited times for clinical appointments to perform investigations and to meet with specialists/clinicians. Very often, these evaluations do not reflect the way the disease is limiting the patient's life. Wearable devices offer the opportunity to collect data on physical activities and important clinical parameters (such as how the patient is active or just staying in bed during the day), on a daily basis. The HG Phoenix AI- based Smart Watch produced by Health Gauge, an Albertan company based in Edmonton, has the potential to measure heart rate, heart rate variability, blood pressure, pulse wave velocity, respiratory rate, temperature, arterial saturation, sleep pattern (deep, light sleep, awake time), duration and time, daily physical activities (site count and distance) and calories burnt in a simple and non-invasive fashion. Ideally, these parameters could be monitored and recorded 24 hours per 7 days per week. This study aims to demonstrate that this device can be used for a long time at home and it is comfortable to use for the participants, that it is not dangerous and, possibly, that it can help to identify exacerbations before the currently available investigations.