Home blood pressure monitoring is nothing new but accurately measuring blood pressure without using a cuff is. Valencell, a company with a history of developing photoplethysmography (PPG) sensor technology to measure heart rate, oxygen levels, respiration rate, and other vitals, has debuted a fingertip blood pressure monitor that is expected to be the first cuffless, calibration-free blood pressure monitor.
The easy-to-use fingertip device looks like a pulse oximeter that measures blood oxygen levels. It clamps onto the finger and delivers a measurement in less than a minute.
Instead of a cuff, the device’s PPG sensor reflects light to measure blood flow patterns. The device then uses AI algorithms Valencell has developed (on more than 7,000 patients) to process the data, taking into account the user’s age, weight, gender, and height. The diastolic and systolic results are shown on the built-in screen in about a minute.
The blood pressure monitor has to be set up using the Valencell app. Once your profile is set up, it is sent to the device, and you can use the device on its own. It will store readings and sync them with the app to store and share with healthcare professionals. In addition to storing blood pressure data, Valencell’s app is built with other features to help the billions of people worldwide suffering from hypertension by reminding them to take medication, track blood pressure measurements, and manage and share their health data.
Once the device gets FDA clearance, which the company says will hopefully be in late 2023, it will sell for $99.
[Image credit: Andrea Smith/Techlicious, Valencell]
Andrea Smith is an award-winning technology broadcast journalist, reporter, and producer. Andrea was the Technology Producer and an on-air Technology contributor at ABC News for over two decades before becoming the Lifestyle Channel Editor at Mashable, where she explored the ways in which real people, not just geeks, began using technology in their everyday lives.
