A Comprehensive Comparison of Commercial Wrist- Worn Trackers in a Young Cohort in a Lab- Environment

In today’s society, the use of watch-based technology is growing steadily and is being used in a wide range of applications and on different aspects of the user’s life, from sport and fitness measurement, to entertainment and healthcare evaluation. Considering the multiple application fields for smartwatch/wristbands and their potential adoption in precision medicine applications, it is thus critical to investigate the performance and accuracy of these devices in different potential scenarios of interest. This study investigated the performance and accuracy of a variety of commercially available activity trackers as regards the estimation of stepcount, distance, and heart rate in a number of walking/household/sedentary activities typical in everyday life, and recreated in a lab-environment in a study population of young adults. Results show that heart rate and stepcount measurements are accurate but unstandardized activities, such as common domestic or leisure tasks, may cause large errors in some devices. Finally, travelled distance can also represent a quantification challenge when climbing up/downstairs. This preliminary work will support the next phase of the project whose goal is to evaluate elderly subjects in lab- and freeliving environments in an ambient assisted living context.