Apple Watch saves another life

Apple Watch ECG feature (Image credit: iMore)

What you need to know

UK man's Apple Watch alerted him of an irregular heartbeat.
Doctors said it was "unlikely" to be the case.
He was diagnosed with two faulty heart valves.

We've heard plenty of stories where an Apple Watch has saved lives and Apple even made a big deal of the fact during its recent Apple Watch Series 5 announcement. And now another life has potentially been saved, this time in the UK.

Tabloid newspaper The Sun reports that fitness fan Chris Mint, 30, was wearing his Apple Watch when it reported that he potentially had atrial fibrillation. That's a feature that's available on Apple Watch Series 1 and later, but Mint apparently had no idea it existed. So he did what the watch suggested and sought the opinion of medical professional.

When he did, they said that it was "unlikely" that the watch was correct, but thankfully they conducted a full examination and confirmed the diagnosis. After seeing a specialist Mint was told he had "two leaking heart valves". Doctors went on to tell him that if his Apple Watch hadn't notified him of the issue he could have gone on to have a heart attack or stroke.

When emailed about the story by the man's wife, Apple CEO Tim Cook responded saying "I'm glad your husband sought treatment and is fine now. Thanks for sharing his story — it inspires us to keep pushing forward."

Apple executives recently said that the health benefits came about by accident. We imagine Chris Mint and his family would call that a very happy accident indeed.

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too.

Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.

3 Comments

Its a shame it doesn't inspire Apple to even apply for certification in Australia.
That's pretty cool—but as a doctor, if I were to diagnose someone with atrial fibrillation and then say "I saved your life," every other doctor I know would tell me I was full of ****.
I can't say that it "saved my life" but my Apple Watch 3 alerted me that my pulse exceeded 120 BPM over the previous 10 minutes (it's normally ~58). After sitting there not feeling too well, it again alerted me. I checked my BP, which was 90/64. A trip to the ER confirmed I was in AFib. Never would have known without my Watch telling me "something" was wrong.