Apple has introduced a suite of transformative health features at its latest product event, with a focus on sleep and hearing health. These updates aim to support conditions impacting billions worldwide, furthering Apple’s commitment to user health and well-being. The updates include sleep apnea notifications on Apple Watch and the introduction of the world’s first all-in-one hearing health experience via AirPods Pro 2.
Sleep Apnea Notifications: A New Way to Detect Breathing Disturbances
Apple Watch is taking its health monitoring capabilities to the next level with a new Breathing Disturbances metric that detects signs of sleep apnea, a condition affecting over 1 billion people globally. Using the watch’s accelerometer, this feature tracks small movements during sleep and notifies users if signs of moderate to severe sleep apnea are detected. These notifications will be available this month in over 150 countries, pending marketing authorization from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and other global health bodies.
This feature provides insightful sleep data, allowing users to track patterns over time and discuss potential treatment options with healthcare providers. The notifications build on existing Apple Watch sleep features, enabling users to monitor important overnight metrics like heart rate and respiratory rate.
AirPods Pro 2: Revolutionizing Hearing Health
With AirPods Pro 2, Apple is offering the first-ever integrated hearing health experience, which includes:
- Loud Sound Reduction, actively minimizing harmful environmental noise.
- A clinically validated Hearing Test, allowing users to assess their hearing from the comfort of their home.
- An over-the-counter Hearing Aid feature, offering clinical-grade assistance for those with mild to moderate hearing loss.
This hearing aid functionality, powered by a personalized hearing profile, adjusts sounds in real-time, enhancing the user’s ability to engage in conversations and interact with their surroundings. Users will also benefit from tailored audio settings across various media, from music to phone calls. This innovative feature is expected to launch this fall in more than 100 countries, pending regulatory approval.
A Step Forward in Global Health
Sumbul Desai, M.D., Apple’s vice president of Health – “Apple, we believe that technology can help you live a healthier life, and we’re excited to enable incredible new health capabilities for serious conditions that affect billions of people around the world, while continuing to keep user data private. With Apple Watch, we continue to offer our users the ability to uncover important health conditions with new sleep apnea notifications. And on AirPods Pro, powerful features put users’ hearing health front and centre, bringing new ways to help test for and receive assistance for hearing loss.”
Privacy at the Core
As always, user privacy remains central to Apple’s health offerings. Health data is encrypted both in transit and on Apple servers, ensuring that users maintain control over their sensitive information.
Availability
The sleep apnea notifications will be supported on Apple Watch Series 9, Series 10, and Ultra 2, while the hearing health features will be available for AirPods Pro 2 with the latest firmware updates this fall.
Apple continues to set the bar for health technology, improving the lives of billions worldwide with innovative, accessible solutions.
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