Over the past few years, we have entered a new era of wellness. Individuals desire more knowledge in order to have a more holistic understanding of their health. Ensuring everyone has access to the tools they need to improve their health is crucial and empowers individuals to create the best version of themselves.
The Samsung Heart Wise1 The home-based cardiac rehabilitation project represents a solution to this challenge. A collaboration between Samsung Research2 America, Samsung Electronics America, and healthcare organization Kaiser Permanente, the HeartWise program pioneered a home-based alternative to traditional health center-assisted cardiac rehabilitation using Samsung wearable devices. This year, the Journal of the American Medical Association, a leading peer-reviewed medical journal, published an article3 showing that the HeartWise program produced results that not only matched the effectiveness of centre-based approaches, but actually exceeded them.
To explore the impact programs like HeartWise could have on modern healthcare systems, Samsung Newsroom caught up with Ricky Y. Choi and Matthew Wiggins at the Samsung Research America campus in Mountain View, California. Choi is the head of digital health at Samsung Electronics America and a clinical professor at Stanford, and Wiggins is the head of the Health Solutions Lab at Samsung Research America.
Q: Before going into the details of the study results, can you give us an idea of the difference between this model of cardiac rehabilitation at home and traditional models? And how does it work in sync with established systems?
[Ricky Y. Choi] At Samsung, we believe our role is to technologically enable a standard of care without necessarily being the direct provider of primary care. So we’re adding another tool that healthcare providers can use. It is a tool that allows patients to participate in care from home, in an engaging and comfortable way that does not bypass the healthcare system, but adds scalability to the number of patients to whom care can be delivered. .
In practice, patients complete the program at home and then report to their care manager. Our goal is to find the technological layer that can allow patients to do certain things on their own, at home, with periodic check-ins with their case manager.
Q: The study showed that patients recovering at home4 experienced an 18.2% improvement in readmissions within 12 months of recovery. The Samsung HeartWise program has shown that cardiac recovery can, with the right support, be more successful using this model at home than at the rehab centers you mentioned. Can you put into context the importance of this discovery for the readers?
[Choi] The study supports the idea that patients, with the right support, are more successful in continuing their cardiac rehabilitation in the comfort of their own home. Furthermore, this success is confirmed in traditional measures of health care outcomes, such as an associated decline in the readmission rate, which is one of the most important health and economic outcome measures and indicators of quality of care. health. It is extremely significant that this is the case in various populations.
[Matthew Wiggins] Another important thing about the study is that it proves that it can work. It used to be that people said, “That sounds good, but there has to be evidence that problems won’t happen down the line.” This needs to be studied and proven. However, now we are starting to see that this method is doing well compared to traditional models. In fact, in this case, it came out better.
Q: A previous study in the New England Journal of Medicine also showed positive results for home programs for cardiac recovery. What were your expectations at the start of the study?
[Wiggins] Kaiser Permanente patients in the program were doing very well and were very happy. All the information we had pointed to this program, combining Kaiser Permanente’s clinical workflows with Samsung’s wearable technology, would help people in the home-based cardiac rehabilitation program as much as those in center-based programs. We were happy to see that the study proved what we had always believed.
[Choi] We were all happy with the results. The standard of care is clear: patients with certain heart conditions and certain procedures must complete a cardiac rehabilitation program. However, very few do. This is partly because for many of these patients it may be difficult to access a center-based program. Many center-based programs have physical capacity and staffing constraints. A highly engaging program that patients can follow at home addresses these issues. Thus, patients can focus more on their health.
Q: This study involved the use of Galaxy smartwatches, including commercially available features on the latest line of Galaxy smartwatches. What role did these devices play in research and what features are used in the process?
[Choi] Our in-home program is based on a digital solution that includes a Samsung smartwatch, a smartwatch app, and an app that patients download to their personal phone. Smartwatches collect biosensor data, guide patients through activities, and collect key patient-entered information or patient-reported results.
[Wiggins] The Samsung smartwatches used in the program provide the user with step count, heart rate and exercise duration information to facilitate the appropriate level and duration of exertion for their assignment to the rehabilitation program . They also allow patients to report how they felt during their exercise session. He then provides this information to their care team to keep them on track during periodic check-ups.
Another benefit of home cardiac rehab is convenience for the patient, and smartwatches play a big part in that convenience. Patients can exercise on their own schedule at a location of their choosing with a Samsung smartwatch on their wrist, rather than at a facility that must be scheduled and traveled, sometimes over great distances. This leads to greater participation and compliance in rehabilitation.
Q: The HeartWise program has tracked the recovery of over 13,000 patients. This study alone saw the participation of more than 2,500 people. From a research perspective, what are the benefits of having so many participants?
[Wiggins] The large sample size adds confidence in the results, but in my opinion, the inclusion in the sample of higher-risk cardiac patients than those involved in previous studies is also important. Additionally, the diversity of the subject pool is encouraging because it represents a broader demographic cross-section of the U.S. population and the situations in which the program will need to operate in order to be successful nationally.
Q: Ricky, you’re a medical doctor working in business strategy, and Matthew, you’re the head of Samsung’s Health Solutions Lab. What was it like bringing your respective areas of interest and expertise to this project?
[Choi] I am a clinical professor at Stanford and a practicing physician with nearly 15 years of experience in practice. I came to Samsung because I wanted to shake things up in healthcare with innovative solutions at scale. HeartWise is a great example of what the power of innovation Samsung could do in healthcare. It has been a privilege to work with such brilliant and mission-minded colleagues in research and development.
[Wiggins] Bridging the gap between what wearable technology can do and how it can be integrated into real-world clinical workflows is critical to enabling the future of digital health. It is an honor for me to be part of this innovative and collaborative partnership that successfully addresses all these challenges.
1 Samsung HeartWise is intended to track or encourage general health, healthy activities and healthy choices, which, as part of a healthy lifestyle, can help improve the lives of people with certain diseases or chronic conditions. . Samsung HeartWise is not a medical application and as such is not intended for use in the diagnosis of acute or chronic diseases or other conditions, or in the cure, mitigation, treatment or prevention of acute or chronic diseases or other conditions. You should consult a doctor before starting any new lifestyle or fitness regimen. Your use of Samsung HeartWise does not constitute medical advice. The Samsung HeartWise app is available on the App Store for download, but a username and password provided by Kaiser Permanente under the supervision of a doctor is required.
2 Samsung Research, acting as Samsung Electronics’ advanced R&D center, leads the development of future technologies for the company’s Device eXperience (DX) division.
3 Comparison of Home and Center Cardiac Rehabilitation in Hospitalization, Medication Adherence, and Risk Factor Control in Patients with Cardiovascular Disease
4 This retrospective cohort study was conducted with patients from Kaiser Permanente Southern California (KPSC), an integrated healthcare system serving approximately 4.7 million patients, who participated in CR between April 1, 2018, and April 30, 2018. April 2019, and with follow-up to April 30, 2020. Data was analyzed from January 2021 to January 2022.
Over the past few years, we have entered a new era of wellness. Individuals desire more knowledge in order to have a more holistic understanding of their health. Ensuring everyone has access to the tools they need to improve their health is crucial and empowers individuals to create the best version of themselves.
The Samsung Heart Wise1 The home-based cardiac rehabilitation project represents a solution to this challenge. A collaboration between Samsung Research2 America, Samsung Electronics America, and healthcare organization Kaiser Permanente, the HeartWise program pioneered a home-based alternative to traditional health center-assisted cardiac rehabilitation using Samsung wearable devices. This year, the Journal of the American Medical Association, a leading peer-reviewed medical journal, published an article3 showing that the HeartWise program produced results that not only matched the effectiveness of centre-based approaches, but actually exceeded them.
To explore the impact programs like HeartWise could have on modern healthcare systems, Samsung Newsroom caught up with Ricky Y. Choi and Matthew Wiggins at the Samsung Research America campus in Mountain View, California. Choi is the head of digital health at Samsung Electronics America and a clinical professor at Stanford, and Wiggins is the head of the Health Solutions Lab at Samsung Research America.
Q: Before going into the details of the study results, can you give us an idea of the difference between this model of cardiac rehabilitation at home and traditional models? And how does it work in sync with established systems?
[Ricky Y. Choi] At Samsung, we believe our role is to technologically enable a standard of care without necessarily being the direct provider of primary care. So we’re adding another tool that healthcare providers can use. It is a tool that allows patients to participate in care from home, in an engaging and comfortable way that does not bypass the healthcare system, but adds scalability to the number of patients to whom care can be delivered. .
In practice, patients complete the program at home and then report to their care manager. Our goal is to find the technological layer that can allow patients to do certain things on their own, at home, with periodic check-ins with their case manager.
Q: The study showed that patients recovering at home4 experienced an 18.2% improvement in readmissions within 12 months of recovery. The Samsung HeartWise program has shown that cardiac recovery can, with the right support, be more successful using this model at home than at the rehab centers you mentioned. Can you put into context the importance of this discovery for the readers?
[Choi] The study supports the idea that patients, with the right support, are more successful in continuing their cardiac rehabilitation in the comfort of their own home. Furthermore, this success is confirmed in traditional measures of health care outcomes, such as an associated decline in the readmission rate, which is one of the most important health and economic outcome measures and indicators of quality of care. health. It is extremely significant that this is the case in various populations.
[Matthew Wiggins] Another important thing about the study is that it proves that it can work. It used to be that people said, “That sounds good, but there has to be evidence that problems won’t happen down the line.” This needs to be studied and proven. However, now we are starting to see that this method is doing well compared to traditional models. In fact, in this case, it came out better.
Q: A previous study in the New England Journal of Medicine also showed positive results for home programs for cardiac recovery. What were your expectations at the start of the study?
[Wiggins] Kaiser Permanente patients in the program were doing very well and were very happy. All the information we had pointed to this program, combining Kaiser Permanente’s clinical workflows with Samsung’s wearable technology, would help people in the home-based cardiac rehabilitation program as much as those in center-based programs. We were happy to see that the study proved what we had always believed.
[Choi] We were all happy with the results. The standard of care is clear: patients with certain heart conditions and certain procedures must complete a cardiac rehabilitation program. However, very few do. This is partly because for many of these patients it may be difficult to access a center-based program. Many center-based programs have physical capacity and staffing constraints. A highly engaging program that patients can follow at home addresses these issues. Thus, patients can focus more on their health.
Q: This study involved the use of Galaxy smartwatches, including commercially available features on the latest line of Galaxy smartwatches. What role did these devices play in research and what features are used in the process?
[Choi] Our in-home program is based on a digital solution that includes a Samsung smartwatch, a smartwatch app, and an app that patients download to their personal phone. Smartwatches collect biosensor data, guide patients through activities, and collect key patient-entered information or patient-reported results.
[Wiggins] The Samsung smartwatches used in the program provide the user with step count, heart rate and exercise duration information to facilitate the appropriate level and duration of exertion for their assignment to the rehabilitation program . They also allow patients to report how they felt during their exercise session. He then provides this information to their care team to keep them on track during periodic check-ups.
Another benefit of home cardiac rehab is convenience for the patient, and smartwatches play a big part in that convenience. Patients can exercise on their own schedule at a location of their choosing with a Samsung smartwatch on their wrist, rather than at a facility that must be scheduled and traveled, sometimes over great distances. This leads to greater participation and compliance in rehabilitation.
Q: The HeartWise program has tracked the recovery of over 13,000 patients. This study alone saw the participation of more than 2,500 people. From a research perspective, what are the benefits of having so many participants?
[Wiggins] The large sample size adds confidence in the results, but in my opinion, the inclusion in the sample of higher-risk cardiac patients than those involved in previous studies is also important. Additionally, the diversity of the subject pool is encouraging because it represents a broader demographic cross-section of the U.S. population and the situations in which the program will need to operate in order to be successful nationally.
Q: Ricky, you’re a medical doctor working in business strategy, and Matthew, you’re the head of Samsung’s Health Solutions Lab. What was it like bringing your respective areas of interest and expertise to this project?
[Choi] I am a clinical professor at Stanford and a practicing physician with nearly 15 years of experience in practice. I came to Samsung because I wanted to shake things up in healthcare with innovative solutions at scale. HeartWise is a great example of what the power of innovation Samsung could do in healthcare. It has been a privilege to work with such brilliant and mission-minded colleagues in research and development.
[Wiggins] Bridging the gap between what wearable technology can do and how it can be integrated into real-world clinical workflows is critical to enabling the future of digital health. It is an honor for me to be part of this innovative and collaborative partnership that successfully addresses all these challenges.
1 Samsung HeartWise is intended to track or encourage general health, healthy activities and healthy choices, which, as part of a healthy lifestyle, can help improve the lives of people with certain diseases or chronic conditions. . Samsung HeartWise is not a medical application and as such is not intended for use in the diagnosis of acute or chronic diseases or other conditions, or in the cure, mitigation, treatment or prevention of acute or chronic diseases or other conditions. You should consult a doctor before starting any new lifestyle or fitness regimen. Your use of Samsung HeartWise does not constitute medical advice. The Samsung HeartWise app is available on the App Store for download, but a username and password provided by Kaiser Permanente under the supervision of a doctor is required.
2 Samsung Research, acting as Samsung Electronics’ advanced R&D center, leads the development of future technologies for the company’s Device eXperience (DX) division.
3 Comparison of Home and Center Cardiac Rehabilitation in Hospitalization, Medication Adherence, and Risk Factor Control in Patients with Cardiovascular Disease
4 This retrospective cohort study was conducted with patients from Kaiser Permanente Southern California (KPSC), an integrated healthcare system serving approximately 4.7 million patients, who participated in CR between April 1, 2018, and April 30, 2018. April 2019, and with follow-up to April 30, 2020. Data was analyzed from January 2021 to January 2022.