Last Updated on January 31, 2023 by pg@petergamma.org
We think that there are just way too much validation studies which validate accuracy of consumer sports sensors not at the level of a scientific study with numerical and statistical data in a high quality scientific journals.
For us personally, very helpful are the two papers of Dr. Milind Desais group from Cleveland Clinic in Ohio:
Variable Accuracy of Wearable Heart Rate Monitors during Aerobic Exercise
Accuracy of commercially available heart rate monitors in athletes: a prospective study
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6732081/
We consider these two papers as a raw model for future scientific studies about accuracy studies of consumer grade sports sensors, although we have to admit, that we did not study these to papers in every detail. Check the details yourself, and if our statement is.
We especially miss high-quality scientific studies about the potentially currently most accurate consumer grade sports watch, which is the Apple Watch Ultra, or one of the watches, which have a comparable accuracy in Rob ter Horsts plot. Check Rob ter Horsts data for further details.
We think what is really helpful for people is to identify specific protocols that are tractable, convenient, and that suits the kind of training athletes & mediators are pursuing, and use those as generally accepted validation protocol in these kind of papers. We especially miss scientific accuracy validation studies at the level of papers in Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise.
Only studies at that level are helpful for further studies at the level of Dr. Desais group from the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio, Dr. Zindel V. Segal from University of Toronto Scarborough, and the Swiss Research Institute interested in clinical and research grade scientific studies of consumer grade sport sensors. This institute is lead by director & physiologist Peter Gamma.