One-Year Watch Use Patterns in the Electronic Framingham Heart Study

• Activity Number: 25 - Medical Devices and Diagnostics Speed Session
• Type: Contributed
• Date/Time: Sunday, August 8, 2021 : 1:30 PM to 3:20 PM
• Sponsor: Section on Medical Devices and Diagnostics
• Author(s): Chathurangi H. Pathiravasan* and Yuankai Zhang and Xuzhi Wang and Ludovic Trinquart and Emelia J. Benjamin and Belinda Borrelli and David D. McManus and Vik Kheterpal and Honghuang H. Lin and Michael M. Hammond and Nicole L. Spartano and Eric Schramm and Chris Nowak and Jelena Kornej and Chunyu Liu and Joanne M. Murabito
• Companies: Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health and Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health and Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health and Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health and Department of Epidemiology, Boston University Schools of Medicine and Public Health and Boston University Henry M Goldman School of Dental Medicine and Department of Medicine, University of Massachusetts Medical School and Care Evolution and Department of Medicine, Boston University School of Medicine and Institute's Framingham Heart Study and Section of Endocrinology, Diabetes, Nutrition, and Weight Management, Boston University and Care Evolution and Care Evolution and Framingham Heart Study and Department of Biostatistics, Boston University School of Public Health and Department of Medicine, Boston University School of Medicine
• Keywords: electronic Framingham Heart Study; physical activity levels; clustering; smartwatch; temporal patterns; watch use

Abstract

Smartwatch use declines overtime in mobile health research. We aimed to evaluate the distinct temporal patterns of watch use behaviors over one year and examine its association with longitudinal physical activity levels in the electronic Framingham Heart Study (n=1185; mean age 53, SD 9 years; 59% women). We defined weekly watch use as the number of days that participants wear the watch ? 5 hours. We identified three distinct watch use patterns using k-means clustering; ~ 42% of participants sustained a daily use pattern over one year (daily users), late lapsers (20%) who had engagement of 26 weeks, and early lapsers (38%) who had the lowest frequency of weekly watch use (8 weeks). Daily users were more likely to be older, reported excellent health and had lower scores for depressive symptoms compared to other users. Using linear mixed models, we observed that daily user was significantly associated with higher physical activity compared to early lapsers (702 steps; 95% CI, 362-1042). Late lapser was associated with higher physical activity compared to early lapsers (467 steps; 95% CI, 61-874). Thus, daily watch users are more likely to engage in physical activity than other users.