Tag: heart rate tracking

Categories
Connected Objects Health and Wellness Wearables

SmartCardio keeps you a heartbeat away from your loved ones

A growing number of health monitoring devices that send information to mobile devices are being introduced on crowdfunding sites.

SmartCardio features a wide range of bells and whistles, and follows similar devices that include MOCAheart. SmartCardio lets users monitor their cardiovascular systems, as well as those of their loved ones. It also allows users to view electrocardiogram (ECG) analysis in real time and enables around-the-clock surveillance by cardiologists. One battery charge is sufficient to operate the device for up to seven days, its maker says. An accompanying app will be available for Android, iOS and Windows Phone devices.

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Categories
Smartwatches/Bands

After devouring folding keyboards, FlyShark takes on the smartwatch

A common knock against most smartwatches is that their most significant functions, such as making phone calls, can only be used when a paired smartphone is nearby.

Following their successful campaign for a sleek folding keyboard accessory for smartphones, the makers of the FlyShark Smartwatch have set out to remove this codependence from smartwatches. Specifically, the FlyShark Smartwatch can make private calls and send and receive messages all without requiring users to touch their smartphones. Generally, the FlyShark Smartwatch can function independently so long as there is a Micro SIM card installed.

Like other smartwatches, it also functions as an exercise tracker and heart rate monitor. Unlike the soon to be released Apple Watch, FlyCatch also features a built-in camera. Other features include dual Bluetooth 3.0 and 4.0 support. The campaign, which seeks $10,000, will remain open until April 1, 2014.

FlyShark has some nice features, but the jury’s out on just how much appeal there is for a smartwatch whose main selling point is its independence from the smartphone. Many consumers on the market for a smartwatch, after all, likely already own a smartphone. It’s therefore a little hard to see how FlyShark can compete against popular brands like Samsung, LG, and Apple.

 

Categories
Sleep Wearables

BodyEcho head band tracks vital signs to improve sleep tracking

Some estimates peg the number of Americans who experience problems sleeping at 70 million, although most would agree the number is even higher than that. Unfortunately, having trouble sleeping isn’t considered much of a problem at all and if someone decides to do something about it, the most effective technology to help is stuck in impractical and expensive sleep laboratories.

OxiRate Inc. is looking to take that technology out of the laboratory and onto your head with their BodyEcho sleep system. The system is comprised of a headband that houses a removable, quarter-sized chip almost impossibly packed with heart rate, temperature, and respiratory sensors, along with an accelerometer and an oximeter.

With the oximeter at its core, the combination of technologies allows the BodyEcho to track things like your sleep stages, sleeping positions, and breathing interruptions with increased accuracy. The data gathered can then be reviewed on a Web portal or a smartphone application so that a user can take a more active role in their sleep. An SDK in development will expand on the device’s capabilities too, so look out for those lucid dreaming applications. OxiRate Inc. is looking for $100,000 to finalize BodyEcho, and interested backers can pick one up for $100.

BodyEcho is interested in being the best possible at one thing: sleep tracking. By offering so much technology in a small package, the company is letting everyone else make it something more with the SDK. It seem like everything created with it will be a touch inventive and versatile than other headbands strictly for lucid dreaming, like the DreamNet or the Aurora. Its included oximeter is the star of the show with its ability to provide the refined data only a sleep lab can offer, but its effectiveness ultimately remains to be seen.