Your smartphone is not as smart as your doctor

Every one of us holds smartphone. And it's the easiest to ask question to something which is always ready to answer especially when you are having questions on health and such questions that you cannot ask to people around you and getting an answer from someone is quite difficult.

But let me remind you that answers on questions regarding health always changes from person to person and question to question so the worst you can do is asking a question to your smartphone which is emotionless logic less and highly Unintelligent.

And more worse is thinking that the pulse, blood pressure or oxygen levels shown on your smart gadgets are reliable. What is the science of smart gadgets and how a doctor deals with these parameters is way more different. So what's the difference and who is more reliable let's get into the details.

First things first the major difference between smart gadget that cleans to be health gadget and a doctor is that smart gadgets don't come with a filter and by filter I mean filter of speech or filter of information you can ask your smart gadget about your headache and it will tell you that you have a brain tumor but a doctor would never say this.

You are taking a deep sleep and your pulse records around 50 to 55 beats per minute. Now your smartphone tells you that you have a low pulse and your heart is pumping slower than it should, and then you go back to that smartphone itself and search on "why is my pulse getting slower or what is the cause of my slow heart beats?" and that same phone will tell you that you have a congenital heart disease out of no where, BUT, your doctor will never say this because it is not at all important to measure your pulse or blood pressure while you are having your sleep. Infact your pulse may go down to 50 or 55 Beats per minute when you are fast asleep and that is completely normal.

I always tell my patients not to rely on readings of any of the health gadgets whether it may be a BP machine or even pulse oximeter machine. Because taking out readings in absence of your doctor and getting an out of range reading will only create anxiety and panic. However such altered or out of range readings when recorded in presence of your doctor will be accompanied by valid reasons and logic for those out of range numbers, also there is an added advantage of the solution for such abnormal values of high blood pressure, oxygen saturations, pulse and even temperatures on a thermometer.

In my routine clinical practise also, I frequently stress upon the influence of smart gadgets like phones, watches and digital health gadgets on our everyday health. If we start over monitoring our health parameters we are more likely to get the abnormal readings, and if you don't have a doctor around you to explain the valid reasons for it, you are going to get answers for it and where you will be going!? The near and dear one.. your smart phone..! Which almost always have a fixed answer! That you are going to die soon with cancer or heart attack! Because as I said  your smart gadgets are emotionless logic less and highly UN intelligent. And why I say this is Because even as doctors when we declare a patient to have cancer we first talk to their families. Its a very slow process to prepare the patient to hear out something this serious. But your smart phone doesn't care about all this because it hasn't seen the impact of death, the emotional burden it creates on the family, the fear it creates in the eyes of the patient who is going to die soon! But your doctor has been through all this, infact they are trained and educated for an entire decade to handle such situations. So whom would you rely on?... Make a wise choice !!

Do comment your thoughts on this, let's get more insights on this important topic!