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Monitor your heart with a smartphone

  • 25 April 2019
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Monitor your heart with a smartphone
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Your smartphone can help keep you fit and healthy. One of its neatest tricks is monitoring your heart. In fact, it's so neat that hospitals are now interested in this mobile tech.

A study has revealed that a new smartphone-controlled heart monitor is far more effective (and cheaper) at diagnosing cardiovascular issues than a standard ECG monitor.

Joint research by the British Heart Foundation and Chest Heart and Stroke Scotland found that a smartphone ECG “increased the number of patients in whom an ECG was captured during symptoms over five-fold to more than 55%”, which opens up a whole realm of possibilities with this innovative, low-expense technology.


The device is to be carried by paramedics in A&E departments, who will measure the patient’s heartbeat at the scene and send the data off for a doctor to interpret.

Smartphones saving lives? Sounds good to us!


Do you use the heart rate monitor on your phone?


Have you tried a heart rate monitor out on your smartphone yet? It’s easy to get your heart rate but then what? Do you know exactly what to do when you get that magic bpm figure? Read on for the answers…

Your heart rate is an accurate indicator of how hard you’re exercising, so using a monitor can help you calculate your ideal training pace or workout intensity. A good target is 50-85% of your maximum heart rate, and you can calculate your maximum heart rate as 220 minus your age. This is a rough guide only, so if you’re a member of a gym we’d recommend you get advice from a personal trainer. They should be able to do a few quick tests and give you an accurate assessment of your target and maximum heart rates.

You can also use a heart rate monitor to track your general health, by recording your ‘at rest’ heart level at the same time each day. The number of beats per minute can help give you a rough idea of your overall fitness levels (between 60 and 100bpm is the normal adult resting heart rate for most people), and any changes could indicate a possible health issue.

Heart rate monitoring apps for your phone


Even if your smartphone doesn’t have an inbuilt heart rate monitor, there are apps that take advantage of your phone’s camera and flash to monitor your heart rate. One of our favourites is the Runtastic Heart Rate Monitor (free on iOS & Android).

This is one of the best apps for measuring your heart rate with your smartphone camera. You can use it to accurately monitor different types of heart rate (pre and post workout, for example) and track the results on user friendly graphs. Simply place the tip of your finger over your phone's camera to turn your phone into a heart beat monitor, and get your instant heart rate reading.

Do you use any other apps or devices to keep yourself healthy? We’d love to hear your suggestions, so post a reply below!

1 reply

Userlevel 3
Excellent article, thank you. 😎

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