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Tom's Guide
14-05-2025
- Health
- Tom's Guide
Are fitness trackers really prioritizing women's health or just ticking a box?
The best fitness trackers can be excellent accountability tools in your pursuit of a healthy lifestyle. Whether you've got an Apple Watch, a Garmin, or a FitBit, these small but powerful devices can measure everything from your step count and resting heart rate to your maximal oxygen consumption and sleep patterns. According to a review in the Journal of Medical Internet Research, women make up one of the largest groups of fitness tracker users. Many of these devices measure women-centric statistics like menstrual cycle and pregnancy information, but do they really provide women with useful insights into their own health? Or do they just collect data without any real or helpful context? Fitness trackers are wearable items, like watches and rings, that record your personal health metrics using a combination of motion sensors, optical heart rate sensors, and user information like height, weight, and age. They can measure your heart rate at rest and during exercise, the total number of steps you've taken in a day, how many calories you burn, and how many hours of deep sleep you get each night, among other metrics. Many fitness trackers will go even further to provide a deeper look into your overall wellness. Popular trackers from brands like Apple, Garmin, and Woop take the information they record and make estimates on your overall cardiovascular fitness, how much rest and recovery you need, and blood oxygen levels. Fitness trackers are relatively accurate on stats like distances walked and heart rate trends. Your readings may be a bit off based on how you wear your tracker, but for the most part, these kinds of readings are pretty spot on. Other measurements, like calories burned, can be less precise. Fitness trackers make estimates based on the data they collect, like your heart rate and activity levels, combined with objective data like your height, weight, and gender. These estimates don't account for body type or muscle mass, which can have a profound impact on the amount of calories you burn. Cardiovascular fitness measurements can also be a little far from the truth. Accurate VO2 max readings (or the maximum amount of oxygen your body can consume during exercise) are usually recorded using lab equipment and specific tests, whereas fitness tracker VO2 max readings are estimates based on your heart rate levels during exercise and recovery. Get instant access to breaking news, the hottest reviews, great deals and helpful tips. While most fitness trackers offer menstrual cycle tracking as a primary feature, that information alone doesn't necessarily provide a full picture of women's health. A few models go well beyond menstrual cycle tracking with options to report discharge characteristics, mood shifts, and pregnancy events like baby kick counts and hiccups. Garmin fitness trackers offer some of the most detailed women's health insights. Not only can they track cycle dates and phases, but users can continue to track symptoms if periods are irregular or absent due to polycystic ovarian syndrome, menopause, pregnancy and breastfeeding, or contraceptive use. Here's how to use the menstrual tracking feature on your Garmin Watch Garmin's pregnancy tracking options are also some of the most detailed available, offering gestational age and size estimates, recommendations on prenatal nutrition and exercise, and the ability to enter blood glucose levels for management of gestational diabetes. Here's more about the Garmin pregnancy tracking feature. The Apple Watch provides a comprehensive look into women's health data as well, featuring temperature-sensing capabilities that can help determine ovulation days and fertile windows. As is the case with other fitness tracker metrics, though, these readings are just estimates. The Apple Watch also ranked highest in a recent JMIR Formative Research study among women on fitness tracker comfort, features, and motivational qualities. Fitness trackers can maximize your training potential and help you achieve a variety of health goals. Until recently, many fitness trackers focused heavily on activity and exercise without much attention to other wellness aspects. However, thanks to advances and upgrades in wearable tracker technology, fitness tracker brands have begun putting women's health needs at the forefront of their features.
Politico
13-03-2025
- Health
- Politico
How AI responds in life-or-death situations
SAFETY CHECK Two artificial intelligence models were at least as good as mental health professionals in assessing what appropriate responses are to people thinking about suicide, according to a study published this month in the Journal of Medical Internet Research. How so: The study tested how three large language models assessed whether responses to a person whose statements suggested suicidal thoughts responded appropriately or inappropriately. The research was conducted by teams from the RAND Corporation, a nonprofit policy think tank, research institute and consultancy; Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston; Harvard Medical School; and the Brown University School of Public Health. The AI models — OpenAI's ChatGPT, Anthropic's Claude and Google's Gemini — didn't interact directly with people who had suicidal thoughts. Instead, each platform was given instructions from the Suicidal Ideation Response Inventory, which contains patient remarks indicating suicidal thoughts and potential clinician responses. The AI models were instructed to assess which responses were appropriate. Researchers then compared the responses to what suicide experts, mental health professionals and people trained to respond to suicidal thoughts deemed appropriate. The results: Claude's performance was the strongest, surpassing the scores of people who had recently completed suicide intervention training as well as scores from studies with psychiatrists and other mental health professionals, according to the research. ChatGPT's score was close to that of doctoral students in clinical psychology or master's-level counselors. Gemini scored lowest in assessing the most appropriate response to someone experiencing suicidal ideation, similar to scores obtained by staff at K-12 schools before receiving suicide intervention training. However: 'All three AI models showed a consistent tendency to overrate the appropriateness of clinician responses to suicidal thoughts, suggesting room for improvement in their calibration,' RAND said in a statement about the study. Why it matters: Researchers say AI models have the potential to help a large number of people struggling with mental health issues and suicidal thoughts because they're more accessible and cheaper than professional help. But the technology could also harm people if it's not trained to respond appropriately. Calibrating AI to prompt the correct response is crucial as U.S. suicide rates have reached record levels, with more than 49,000 people dying by suicide in 2022, the latest year for which the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has finalized data available. More than 13 million people had suicidal thoughts, and 1.6 million of them made a suicide attempt that year, according to the CDC. 'We are pressure testing a benchmark that could be used by tech platforms building mental health care, which would be especially impactful in communities that have limited resources,' said Ryan McBain, the study's lead author and a senior RAND policy researcher. But, McBain cautioned, AI models can't replace crisis lines or professional care. WELCOME TO FUTURE PULSE This is where we explore the ideas and innovators shaping health care. Large artificial intelligence models should be viewed in the same way as other older technologies like printing, which have reshaped knowledge distribution — not feared as superintelligent autonomous agents, scientists from Johns Hopkins, the University of Chicago and other institutions argue in Science today. Share any thoughts, news, tips and feedback with Carmen Paun at cpaun@ Daniel Payne at dpayne@ Ruth Reader at rreader@ or Erin Schumaker at eschumaker@ Are you a current or former federal worker who wants to share a tip securely? Message us on Signal: CarmenP.82, DanielP.100, RuthReader.02 or ErinSchumaker.01. WASHINGTON WATCH John Burklow, a nearly 40-year veteran of the National Institutes of Health, is being removed as the agency's chief of staff and replaced by a political appointee, Erin and POLITICO's Adam Cancryn scooped, according to three people familiar with the matter who were granted anonymity because the decision isn't yet public. The agency is expected to appoint Seana Cranston as the NIH's new chief of staff, two of the people said, though they cautioned it isn't final and could change. Cranston is a former deputy chief of staff to Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and also spent several years as the lawmaker's legislative director. Why it matters: The move would represent a sharp departure from the NIH's longtime practice of appointing career officials as chief of staff to the agency's director. Burklow, who's held the role since 2021, previously spent 20 years as a senior communications official at NIH — a tenure that spanned Republican and Democratic administrations. Trump health officials have signaled plans to drastically overhaul the NIH, including refocusing its research, revamping its workforce and slashing funding for universities and grantees. Last month, Trump aides ordered the NIH to impose a blanket cap on funding to universities for administrative and facilities costs — prompting lawsuits and warnings that the move would force schools to shutter laboratories and lay off staff. The decision has since been blocked by the courts. More recently, the NIH canceled $250 million in grants to Columbia University. President Donald Trump's pick to run the NIH, Stanford Medical School professor Jay Bhattacharya, has long criticized the agency for ceding too much power to career officials. An NIH spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment. What's next: The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee approved Bhattacharya's confirmation this morning by a 12-11 vote along party lines. The nomination now heads to the full Senate for consideration.
