Apple Watch Series 10 Prototype With Unique Health Sensor Revealed

I have hypertension and take medication. It is a serious enough of a medical condition and concern I would not trust Apple Watch to measure it any way, even for fun.

You'd be surprised how inaccurate some of the equipment labeled medical-grade actually is

It's for blood pressure. Gurman talked about this in 2023. He reported later Apple faced difficulty getting accurate readings from it.

"A new sensor to detect when a person’s blood pressure is elevated. The initial system won’t show a user their exact systolic and diastolic measurements, but the company is working on a follow-up version for later that could. This will be coupled with a new blood pressure journal so a user can notate what was happening when hypertension occurred."

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-11-01/apple-plans-hypertension-sleep-apnea-detection-for-next-watch

I have hypertension and take medication. It is a serious enough of a medical condition and concern I would not trust Apple Watch to measure it any way, even for fun.

It's for blood pressure. Gurman talked about this in 2023. He reported later Apple faced difficulty getting accurate readings from it.

"A new sensor to detect when a person’s blood pressure is elevated. The initial system won’t show a user their exact systolic and diastolic measurements, but the company is working on a follow-up version for later that could. This will be coupled with a new blood pressure journal so a user can notate what was happening when hypertension occurred."

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-11-01/apple-plans-hypertension-sleep-apnea-detection-for-next-watch

I have hypertension and take medication. It is a serious enough of a medical condition and concern I would not trust Apple Watch to measure it any way, even for fun.

And you shouldn't rely on a Apple Watch for any medical reasons.

My Apple Watch doesn't keep me alive and I don't rely on it. However, if there's a chance that it will register my bad fall and call for help, I don't complain. Should I be caught in a situation without my phone, but I have to call for help, I would not shy away from using my cellular Apple Watch to make the call. If my watch warns me about abnormal high heart rate, I would look into it. Just like if I had hypertension, I would welcome the watch to warn me, if there should be anything out of the ordinary that would warrant a check with a full blown blood pressure machine. Just like you shouldn't rely on all the safety systems in your car, but it's nice when they are there.

Point is, that the Apple Watch is not as good as the best solutions, but it sits on you all the time and can do multiple checks, automatically, all day, and maybe warn about things before they get worse.

Just my opinion if this sensor array is indeed for blood pressure readings:
I've been living with essential HBP (unclear cause for it, take daily medication) for the last 8 years, and I wouldn't trust any wearable's readings for it. Dedicated BP wrist-worn "medical-grade" monitor devices for this purpose are awful. Many times I don't even trust my automatic digital arm BP monitor for it, and reach out for my old-school stethoscope and mercury-scale baumanometer, just to confirm.
I think it would be a very hard to sell feature to people with blood pressure conditions, unless there is some sort of medical breakthrough that really sets monitoring apart from current tech.

Without a radical breakthrough that negates the need to restrict blood flow in order to measure BP consistently and accurately, I don’t see any wrist-top watch-like device being of any use for BP measurement any time soon. I think even when we start getting such devices, the sensor’s operating parameters affected by amount of pressure the device has to exert on the skin, skin moisture, or any parameter affected by how the user chooses to wear the watch (position, tightness of strap) will make them useless for some time after that for anyone with an actual meed to monitor BP. Approximations are not useful, especially if consistency across readings cannot be achieved due to some of the issues above.


I am not a doctor but I’ve had the same doctor for almost 20 years and I would bet money that this is exactly what he would say to me if I asked him about any wristwatch device.

100%. It's why my doctor makes me bring in my personal blood pressure monitor to appointments, because consistency of tools is important. I still see people checking their blood pressure in like those things in CVS stores and I sorta shake my head.

I appreciate Apple's push into health, but this is not a mass market, lowest common denominator thing.