Fitbit’s wearable health trackers can be used to monitor daily activity, sleep patterns, heart rate, blood oxygen levels, skin temperature and, as of last month, possible signs of atrial fibrillation—and, now, all of those round-the-clock measurements could help support those recovering from substance abuse.
The Google-owned devicemaker has teamed up with Pretaa, developer of a platform that converts data gathered from wearables into guidance and suggestions to help treat substance use disorders.
The collaboration, unveiled Oct. 11, was formed through Fitbit’s Health Solutions division, which is separate from its direct-to-consumer business and works with employers, insurers, health systems and other corporate partners to apply Fitbit’s devices and data to new healthcare tools.
Pretaa’s digital platform and mobile app take in data from wearable devices, including activity and sleep tracking, oxygen levels, body temperature and heart rate. It also performs regular check-ins with the system’s users, asking, for example, how likely they feel they are to relapse and whether they’d like a caregiver or pre-specified family member or friend to reach out.
The check-ins are designed to provide a combination of positive reinforcement and actionable advice “to improve treatment outcomes, build resiliency and reconnect friends and family with their loved ones in recovery,” Michael Madon, Pretaa’s CEO, said in Tuesday’s announcement.
The platform compiles all of the collected information into daily reports that are sent to caregivers. It also analyzes the information in real time—thanks to embedded machine learning algorithms—and sends alerts to designated healthcare providers and loved ones if any of the collected data or self-reported check-ins indicate a potential relapse or other health issue.
With the new Fitbit partnership, Pretaa users will be able to automatically connect their Fitbit devices and data to the platform. They’ll also have access to the Fitbit Premium service, which provides users with a more detailed analysis of the data gathered by their wearable devices each day.
The Pretaa team-up is only the latest in a string of recent upgrades to Fitbit’s health-tracking technology. Earlier this year, the tech maker caught up to competitor Apple with an FDA clearance of its own for an algorithm that could be embedded in its wearables to passively check for afib around the clock.
The algorithm made its prime-time debut in late August, when Fitbit unveiled its newest collection of smartwatches, slated to begin shipping by the end of September. Among those were the Sense 2 device, which the company has positioned as its “most advanced health-focused smartwatch.” It offers not only afib-monitoring abilities, but also a built-in ECG to perform spot checks for arrhythmia, a battery that can last more than six days on a single charge and a new sensor that tracks changes in the sympathetic nervous system to help assess stress levels in real time.