The blood oxygen sensor in the Apple watch is as reliable as the one on any medical grade device

Two years ago, tech giant Apple released its Apple Watch with a built-in blood oxygen sensor. According to the latest report, this sensor is as reliable as the one available in oximeters used in healthcare facilities.

The study, carried out by researchers was added to the Digital Health Journal. The main idea behind this was to compare the blood oxygen sensor reliability with an official oximeter.

To perform the comparison, twenty-four healthy individuals were asked to participate. Every individual had a series 6 watch strapped to their left hand and an oximeter attached to the middle finger of the same hand. The device used for this was the Radical 7 Masimo.

The readings were collected at every 30-second interval and consisted of three stages. The first stage, named the stabilization stage, lasted for two minutes. In this stage, the individuals breathed in the surrounding air, followed by a desaturation stage in which they inhaled the gas mixture with low O2, which resulted in a low blood oxygen level. And then the final stage, termed the stabilization stage, is which individuals take the surrounding air again to bring their blood oxygen level back to normal. All these readings were taken with both the Apple Watch and Radical 7, simultaneously.

The contrast between the two devices, namely the Series 6 watch and the oximeter, for the six percent oxygen level was expected to be ninety to a hundred percent, and for the 8% blood oxygen level, recordings were expected to be no greater than ninety percent.

The unfairness between the two gadgets was found to be 0.00% at all intervals. The results of the test confirmed that the series 6 watch can be trusted with blood oxygen levels.

The feature made its debut on the same watch, and since then, every other Apple watch following series 6, which includes series 7 and 8, and the Ultra, all have this sensor as a built-in feature. Even though it’s a big achievement for the company, they still didn’t advertise much about this feature, which would show Apple challenging the official medical devices. This is why, in the later series, the company didn’t highlight any adjustments made to this sensor.

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by Arooj Ahmed via Digital Information World