Google Research scientist Jake Sunshine MobiHealthNews Google first unveiled the pulse-loss detection technology in the Pixel Watch 3 during its “Made by Google” event at its Bay View headquarters on Tuesday.
The feature, initially available in the EU and UK, detects signs of a missing pulse and turns on infrared and red lights, then looks for further signs of a pulse. A motion sensor then looks for signs of movement.
An AI algorithm then analyses pulse and movement signals to confirm that a pulse has disappeared and counts down to see if the user responds – if not, the watch sends an automated message to emergency services with your condition and location.
MobiHealth News: Can you tell our readers about pulse loss detection technology and how it was developed?
Jake Sunshine: Stopping of the pulse is something that can happen to anyone (young or old) and can happen for a variety of reasons, both inside and outside the heart. The big challenge is that it is an emergency and many people experience these symptoms when they are alone. So we built a system to identify when these symptoms occur and connect people to help faster, especially when no one is around, which is the most helpful scenario.
The sensors used to achieve this include an optics-based heart rate sensor and motion sensors in the watch, combined with machine learning and AI to identify the transition from a pulse state to a pulse loss state.
personal information: How did you research the accuracy and effectiveness of this technique?
Sunshine: This is a big challenge because we can’t just ask people to wait until their hearts stop in order to test it. This feature is so important that we worked with a number of external partners to get feedback on the feature.
We spoke to cardiologists, resuscitation scientists, emergency medical providers, people who respond to 911 calls, and people who actually respond to these emergencies. We wanted to get a holistic perspective to build something that would meet our users’ needs and be accountable.
personal information: If a loss of pulse is detected, the watch will send an automatic message to emergency services. What is the message?
Sunshine: Like other features in the Android safety portfolio and the Pixel safety portfolio, we can send a message that your pulse is no longer detected and that you are unresponsive. And we’ll send that combination along with your location and other features. That’s the gist of the message.
At the end of the day, we recognize a huge challenge that’s costing a lot of lives and we’re trying to build something responsible. To do that, we needed input from this huge emergency response ecosystem to make sure that what we were building was responsible. So we got feedback along the way until we were confident in the technology.
Another important thing is that this is a very important event, so we are working with the regulators to make sure that this event meets high enough standards, so this event will be launched in some European countries and the UK first, and we hope to reach more people in different countries.
personal information: Why is it being launched in the EU and UK first? Is it due to regulations?
Sunshine: No. We want to reach as many people as possible. Different regions have different regulators, so this is our first market and we would like to expand to other markets in the future.
We recognize that this is a big research question, and we are addressing it in a responsible way, getting feedback from external experts and presenting the issue to regulators. This is our approach to solving this problem.
And like any system, this system can’t detect all events. No system can, but what we’re trying to do is collaborate as much as we can on this very difficult problem. So we’re trying to collaborate, and we’re trying to build responsibly and innovative technology to solve this problem.
personal information: Is there anything else you’d like to add for our readers that hasn’t been covered yet?
Sunshine: We want to emphasize that this is the first time we’ve done something so bold and responsible, applying it to a really hard problem. We’ve done everything we can to build this responsibly, taking all the feedback we need to build such an important system before we release it.
