Fitness trackers aren’t worth your money, a top doctor with 30 years of clinical experience said.
However, she does have one exception to this rule: her step count.
“I don’t have a fitness tracker, but I am obsessed with my step count,” Dr. Suzanne O’Sullivan, the author of “The Age of Diagnosis,” which explores the pros and cons of receiving a medical diagnosis, told the April 13 episode of the Intelligence Squared podcast.
“I feel like it just encourages me to make sure I’m a little bit active every day. Choose wisely what you monitor,” added O’Sullivan, a consultant neurologist at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in London.
Healthy people don’t need to be constantly aware of metrics like their heart rate
O’Sullivan said that a healthy person doesn’t need to be aware of automatic bodily processes like sleep, heart rate, and digestion, partly because our bodies change all the time. Every run up the stairs will raise our heart rate, as each bite of food will cause the bowels to move, she said.
But when trackers like smart watches and rings make us aware of these normal changes, interpreting the data without the guidance of a qualified medical professional can be unnecessarily confusing and stressful.
Bodily process “are happening at a level that we don’t really notice them when we’re healthy. And that’s the best way for them to happen,” she said.
Instead, O’Sullivan wants people to focus on how they feel rather than what their tracker says.
“Don’t worry about how many hours you slept. If you wake up in the morning and you’re refreshed and you’re able to get through the day without having to have a nap, well, then you had enough sleep,” she said.
More tests don’t make a better doctor
O’Sullivan also addressed the rise of preventative testing. Full-body MRIs that can cost up to $2,500 and genetic tests are among those increasingly offered by longevity clinics, in addition to more traditional healthcare settings. But health experts have split opinions about their effectiveness.
Some argue there is value in tracking health data to notice conditions early. But O’Sullivan said tests can make a patient feel listened to and make a doctor feel protected from making mistakes, but they also have cons, like showing false-positives. And because equipment has become so advanced in recent years, a test may flag early signs of a disease that never causes symptoms or requires treatment.
“Learn to recognize what good medicine looks like,” O’Sullivan said adding: “You explain your problem to the doctor. You feel like they’ve taken the time to listen and understand and give you an explanation back.”
O’Sullivan recommended having evidence-backed screenings like routine colonoscopies and cervical cancer screenings at the officially recommended ages.
“Go to your doctor for the proper types of screening that are offered by standard health services, and don’t do any extras, because somebody is making money out of making you anxious about your health,” O’Sullivan said.