The smartphone is already the Swiss Army knife of the digital age, replacing the need for alarm clocks, GPS units and even digital cameras with the flick of a finger.
Can it do the same for home medical devices?
At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, iHealth Labs, a start-up in Mountain View, Calif., has unveiled the iHealth Blood Pressure Dock, an attachment for iOS devices that can measure and record heart rate and blood pressure.
The kit, which costs $100, comes with a blood pressure cuff and a battery-powered dock that doubles as a charging station for the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad. For now, the hardware is available for sale on the company's Web site. Eventually, it will also be sold in Apple retail stores and through Apple.com. The kit also requires a mobile application to log the results, which is available for free through iTunes.
Dr. Andrew Brandeis, a practicing doctor in San Francisco and a medical consultant and spokesman for iHealth, said that although the device is primarily aimed at people with hypertension or other chronic health conditions, it can also be helpful for anyone trying to live a healthier life.
"I can give someone a pill for their blood pressure, but what I really want to do is educate them about their habits that cause high blood pressure," he said. "If you can see your blood pressure is going up, you can try to get an idea about what you're doing that is affecting it. You start to see correlations between your blood pressure and your life."
The biggest advantage to those who buy iHealth's blood pressure system instead of a stand-alone machine, which is much cheaper to purchase, is that it will be incorporated into a patient's daily routine of waking up and checking their cellphone, the company says.
"You charge your device at night and when you wake up, the blood pressure cuff is sitting right there next to it," he said.
Taking daily readings at home may also offer more accurate and consistent results than those taken at a doctor's office, he said.
"White coat syndrome is a term used for what happens when patients come in to see the doctor," he said. "They are stressed out because they hate going to the doctor and their blood pressure is higher. But if you take it at home, before your coffee and e-mail, you get a much more accurate reading."
Patients can also share their results with a physician, either via e-mail or by showing them the phone or iPad with the data on it during their next doctor visit.
The application can also push readings to Twitter and Facebook as a way to generate positive reinforcement about good readings among a user's social network, Dr. Brandeis said.
Eventually, the company hopes to also release other home health kits, including a blood glucose monitor and a connected scale.
"This is a doorway to an entire new ecosystem of self-monitoring and gleaning health information about yourself," said Dr. Brandeis.
