Recently, GOQii, one of the most popular fitness trackers in India, added cardiovascular care to its tracking, connecting users with doctors if the data called for it. We ask Vishal Gondal , CEO of GOQii, just three questions:

Fitness trackers are not known for their accuracy. Won’t this unnecessarily alarm users? Or end up missing what it should pick up?

Fitness trackers are not medical devices and might be inaccurate at times. However, GOQii combines our new fitness tracker’s data along with medical reports (such as cardiac specialists), the users’ medical history, and shares it with the GOQii doctor, who can then accordingly make the right diagnosis. It is the doctor who will be able to determine the next course of action for the user. Today, too many devices are generating lots of data, which is essentially junk if not analysed and acted upon. Our tracker gets user data to a doctor who can help make sense of it.

Who initiates the doctor consultation? Is it the user or is the need for a consultation thrown up by the tracker?

The user is required to share his or her health and heart rate data along with the medical report including bloodwork with the GOQii doctors through the GOQii tracker. The doctor can then analyse the data and in specific cases if required refer the user to a cardiac specialist.

Wouldn’t people prefer to share the information with their own selected doctors? And not necessarily Max (which you recommend) that is notoriously expensive?

Currently, GOQii is recommending Max HealthCare, which is known for its specialised heart care for any medical consultation. However, the users are free to use any doctor or hospital as per their choice as their health and heart rate data can be accessed via the tracker.

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