Rockley Photonics (Apple is a big customer) recently announced that it has come up with a ‘clinic-on-the-wrist’, a continuous and non-invasive solution for monitoring biomarkers including glucose, blood pressure and body temperature.
With the Apple Watch already having ECG and blood oxygen level monitoring, the above leads to some interesting possibilities on how Apple can develop their wellbeing offerings.
I think Apple have got strong assets in 3 areas that will help them:
- Data – Apple Watches and iPhones have a number of sensors that provide a wealth of health and fitness information including biomarkers as above and activity information such as steps. They also connect with various other Apps that uses can choose to share information between including sleep and nutrition data. Last year they worked with Electronic Health Record (EHR) suppliers to launch ‘Health Records’, which allows users to combine information held about them in hospital systems with additional data they enter.
- Trust and engagement –Apple invest in security and maintaining user privacy, and users trust Apple with their data. Instilled and driven into the core of everything they do by Steve Jobs, Apple are renowned for creating products and services with a fantastic user experience.
- Ecosystem and community – Apple is good at putting things together – for example, creating the ecosystem around their devices and the AppStore. A more recent example is Fitness+, a subscription service which brings together music users love with customised workouts based on metrics captured through the Apple Watch. One other opportunity is to bring together the passionate Apple user community in a supportive manner (think Weight Watchers) to help each other’s health and wellbeing goals.
I will be watching developments in this space closely over the next few months!
Very happy to hear your comments below or feel free to email me to share ideas – janak@usehealthdata.com