Sometimes innovation in ahead of its time, as was the case for a wearable heart rate monitor.
In 1967 Zeppo Marx, the youngest Marx brother and Duck Soup actor, invented an electric powered wristwatch that would detect if a person’s heart rate became too high or too low.
In 2018 Apple filed a patent for a wristwatch that was capable of detecting conditions using heart rate sensors. The Apple Watch is now one of the most prevalent devices in the world that include medical sensors. The following is from the patent extract:
The devices can include a PPG sensor unit configured to detect multiple occurrences of a given event in the measured signal(s) over a sampling interval. In some instances, the device can register the occurrences of the events. In some examples, the device can include one or more motion sensors configured to detect whether the device is in a low-motion state. The device may delay initiating measurements when the device is not in a low-motion state to enhance measurement accuracy. Examples of the disclosure further include resetting the sample procedure based on one or more factors such as the number of non-qualifying measurements. In some examples, the device can be configured to perform both primary and secondary measurements, where the primary measurements can include readings using a set of operating conditions different from the secondary measurements
