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As a tech journalist, I get access to test to the best technology from the biggest companies in the world, but until a few years ago, I never considered how technology could keep me alive. This all changed after a heart attack at the age of 33 in 2020.
After my heart attack, I use different smart tools to monitor my stats and maintain a healthy … [+]
Illustration: Forbes / Photo: RetailersThe morning after Thanksgiving, I woke up to my heart pounding out of my chest. A trip to the ER discovered that I had a 99% blockage in a major artery that’s terminal for most people who experience this particular heart attack. I was fortunate: I survived and began a long journey to rebuild my health after 30 years of neglect.
Diagnoses of heart disease, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and diabetes left me scared for my future. While I followed doctor’s orders and relied on monthly checkups, I also turned to technology to provide me much-needed daily tracking insights. My journey discovered some essential tools that I still use today to stay healthy—and alive. Here are the products I use daily or weekly to manage my health, why I use them, and how they could possibly save your life.
A few months prior to my heart attack, I ditched smartwatches for analog watches. Upon reflection, had I been wearing an Apple Watch at the time, I could have caught the heart attack before it happened.
Following the heart attack, I use the Apple Watch Ultra 2 to ensure there was always one on my wrist even when the other was charging. It’s health tech features are plentiful: It can take ECGs, track your blood oxygen and, thanks to the upcoming Watch OS 11 update announced at Apple WWDC, it will soon offer proper sleep tracking. But it’s the superb heart rate monitoring which helped me to understand my heart rate patterns. It also alerted me to erratic heart rate and AFib on numerous occasions.
In speaking with Dr. Johanna Contreras, MD, Cardiologist at Mount Sinai Fuster Heart Hospital, it was clear that the Apple Watch’s heart rate features are ideal in understanding someone’s normal heart function. “For normal people that don’t have heart disease, it’s good because it helps them to monitor their heart rate. For exercise, they know how it increases their heart rate, and they know how the value of the exercise that they are doing at the time.”
On the other hand, the Apple Watch Ultra 2 can be useful to monitor the heart rate, but not in the way you might think. After all, for those like me who have heart disease, it can be a good way to keep your heart rate steady. “Some of the medications are blocking or decreasing [a patient’s] heart rate, and we want to keep it that way. It may not be useful for exercise but, it may be useful to know that the heart rate keeps at a level we want to keep it,” Contreras adds.
Beyond the tech features, the real magic of the Apple Watch is Apple Health, and in particular, its ability to sync all your medical records via Medical ID. I visited the ER numerous times, with ambulance callouts in the months that followed as my body got used to the stent in my heart. Each time, the paramedics could quickly access my Medical ID and see all the conditions I had, my latest test results and the medications I took. On more than one occasion, this meant they altered my treatment plan: Without this information, they would have given me medication that could have possibly stopped my heart entirely. Contreras notes that, “when a patient presents in the ER or in another emergency medical situation with an abnormal EKG or heart rate, a prior EKG and previous heart rate readings can help us understand whether this is abnormal for that patient or consistent with prior readings,” she said.
I also really appreciate the fall detection feature and the ability to alert emergency contacts when the Watch detects a medical issue. Because all my family lives overseas, it’s an easy way to keep them informed, and quickly provide their contact information to paramedics and the hospitals. And, since an exercise regimen is an essential component to maintaining my heart health, the Activity Rings also provide a daily visual reminder to motivate me to exercise, especially as I can compete with friends who keep me on track to hit my goals.
As I navigated my recovery and cardiac rehab, my attention turned to my diabetes. For a few months, it felt like a death knell—I couldn’t reduce my glucose numbers. I needed help understanding my body and my health. I discovered the Dexcom G7 Continuous Glucose Monitor (CGM) and it completely transformed my life.
The Dexcom G7 CGM offers high and low sugar alerts—as early as 20 minutes before my glucose levels drop—as well as trends data without the need for fingersticks. Recently, Dexcom also launched the Direct-to-Watch feature that allows me to see my glucose readings and trends data in a complication directly on my Apple Watch home screen. When I’m driving long distances, it’s the perfect way for me to safely and quickly understand if I need to make a pit stop for food or can continue.
Diabetes is a complex disease; I have to be super careful not to let my glucose levels rise too high or drop too low, and the latter was a particular concern overnight. If it drops too low overnight, it can be life threatening, but thankfully the Dexcom G7 alerts me. The CGM also provides valuable insights into how different foods affect my blood sugar. As a result, I successfully lowered my average sugar to non-diabetic levels within just six months. Every diabetic needs a CGM, as it will provide life-saving information and interventions, and the Dexcom G7 CGM is worth every penny.
Contreras added that diabetes is a disease that requires ongoing monitoring, and that’s where smart health monitoring can make managing your health easier. “Nobody wants to be punching his fingers three or four times a day. But with glucose monitors that they can implant in their arms, they can actually keep an eye with their phone,” she says. Monitoring devices like a CGM, or in this case, my Dexcom G7 CGM, allow patients to check their sugar directly from a phone and keep a closer eye on diabetes, and in particular, the trend of average sugar over a period of time.
If you’ve ever had a cardiac event, you’ll know how frustrating it is to try and manage these conditions outside of a medical environment. In the hospital, they can quickly run a 12-lead ECG with precision, but these machines are not portable and cost thousands of dollars—if you’re even able to buy one.
The Kardia Mobile 6-Lead Personal EKG is the solution I use. It’s sleek, slim and small and incredibly portable. This reduction in size doesn’t come at the expense of its capabilities: It can take 6-lead ECGs and can detect AFib, Bradychardia and Tachychardia, all of which offers a solid information foundation for doctors to evaluate me. For context, the Apple Watch Ultra 2 and other wearable devices only take a single lead ECG, i.e. they check the electrical signals using just one contact point, so while they can provide some insight, they aren’t as reliable.
The Kardia Mobile also allows you to send your results to your doctor via PDF, or to certified cardiologists automatically for a remote evaluation. This comes with me on every trip as it’s the simplest—and fastest—way for me to take an ECG on the go.
The latest addition to my health arsenal, the Withings Body Scan Smart Scale allows me to check my weight, body composition and BMI. It then takes this data to the next level by also allowing me to check my heart by running a 6-lead ECG, check my nerves (a key check for diabetics) and understand deeper metrics like blood oxygen and circulation.
I’ve only been using the Withings Body Scan scale for just a few weeks, but the ability to take all of these metrics first thing in the morning is unrivaled. Considering that my heart attack—and many of my other adverse cardiac events—took place overnight, getting a daily ECG reading alongside my body composition data allows me to build a detailed health profile over time. When I see my cardiologist, I’m able to share this data with him, so he can quickly check the daily logs to find specific adverse events that may have been highlighted through various medical tests. This has quickly become my favorite new health tool. There’s no better scale on the market, especially if you have serious health conditions.
The last member of my health kit is the Oura Ring Gen 3 Horizon. I’ve been using this smart ring since I began cardiac rehab. Although I switched to the Whoop Wrist Band for a while, I ultimately returned to the Oura Ring. I missed the deep insights it provides on my sleep and the 24/7 heart rate tracking. It goes beyond sleep, however, by also providing valuable data on my resting heart rate overnight, heart rate variability, respiratory rate and skin temperature—all of which are vital signs I need to track thanks to my various health conditions.
The Oura Ring works with both iOS and Android, so I can pair it with my iPhone 15 Pro Max or my Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra, depending on what else I’m testing. It’s a fantastic ring that my cardiologist recommended to me, and I have been incredibly happy with its insights over the past three years.
Another great feature? Its battery life. The Apple Watch Ultra 2 can last up to two days before I need to place it on my iPhone charging station. The Oura Ring Gen3, in contrast, can last up to a week on a charge, so it’s easy to place it on my finger and not worry about finding the charger.
Sleep is a key part of managing heart disease, and Contreras shed further light on the value of monitoring sleep in a clinical condition. After all, being able to understand how someone is sleeping allows a medical professional to take appropriate steps to help improve this before it can lead to worsening health conditions.
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