Last Updated on January 19, 2023 by pg@petergamma.org
A paper in PLOS ONE claimed, that the Polar OH1 can be used instead of an ECG device, as far as accuracy is concerned:
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0217288
A Swiss paper claims, that the Polar H10 chest strap is the Gold Standard for HR accuracy measurement:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31004219/
The PLOS ONE paper gave us hope that ECG devices can be replaced by optical heart rate measurement devices for accuracy measurements, soon. But the Swiss paper claims that for activities with strong body movements, the Polar H10 chest strap is Gold Standard for HR measurements, and better than Holter ECG devices. Should we use now a Polar H10 chest strap for monitoring our resting heart rate, and wear it 24 * 7 to have the most accurate device? This is very uncomfortable. Where the mentioned papers written by sports physiologists? The topic that complicated ECG devices can be replaced by optical HRMs for certain applications is of interest to cardiologists and physiologists, and also to sports physiologists and sports men, as well as for meditators. We suppose that there will be new devices and new papers sooner or later.
The Swiss paper compared the accuracy of a Polar H10 chest strap to a Holter ECG device. The group of cardiologist Dr. Desai from Cleveland Clinic in Ohio compared for instance the accuracy of Apple watches to the accuracy of their clinic ECG device.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6732081/
Can the Apple watch replace Dr. Desais clinical ECG device as far as accuracy is concerned? No, the accuracy of the Apple watch 3 was 96 %, and the accuracy of the Polar H7 chest strap was 98 % compared to the clinical ECG device, but the accuracy of the Apple watch 3 comes close to the clinical ECG device. We suppose that there will be new devices and new papers sooner or later, and we are looking forward to it.