Comments on: Aktiia bracelet review: cuff-like blood pressure monitoring from the wrist

By: Ina

Ina — Wed, 16 Mar 2022 15:25:33 +0000

In reply to Bruce. What monthly fee are you referring to? I bought my band for £199.99, do they want any more money?

By: Afshin

Afshin — Fri, 04 Mar 2022 16:19:20 +0000

In reply to Anonymous. Totally agree.

By: Paddy

Paddy — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 15:40:48 +0000

In reply to Marko Maslakovic.

Having tested this over a month:
1. There is no sync with Apple Health which is fairly maddening for iOS users. There is no ability to export data at all.
2. The app is a bit buggy eg you cannot set the sleep time, it just reverts to a default when you do.
3. It’s giving very different readings to my Omron calibrated cuff. I’m really extremely doubtful it is accurate and their support site says “may” and “can” etc,
4. It was refused by my aviation medical examiner who said it was flawed because you have to be still, upright etc. I had to go and buy a “proper” one,
5. I did ask to return it but they refused saying the 14 days was up – despite it still being in the box. Reading between the lines I think they are dealing with a huge number of returns.

By: Bruce

Bruce — Wed, 19 Jan 2022 11:36:47 +0000

In reply to Big H. I can't find any reference to obtaining the CardieX device, which appears t be in an early stage of development at present.

By: Bruce

Bruce — Wed, 19 Jan 2022 11:32:44 +0000

In reply to Con. Very similar experience to ours. Difficult when the measurements appear to be inaccurate but also have no consistency in when measurements are taken. I've asked them to add the capability to export readings in CSV form; apparently others have asked for this, so perhaps it may come in future though sadly, I'll be unlikely to benefit from it as I will have abandoned it before then.

By: Bruce

Bruce — Wed, 19 Jan 2022 11:07:29 +0000

We have found that the wrist bracelet produces systolic measurements that are 20 points lower on average than a properly calibrated arm band. Diastolic is about 5 points lower. Recording BP is very sporadic and I have asked Aktiia support for more information on how long a person has to be at rest, and what the trigger for a measurement is. It would be helpful to understand how best to use it, how long to remain at rest and so on. They just shut down my email ticket after giving some unrelated replies that did not address the problems. So despite having great potential, it is in fact not useful for us. Oh, and I learned of the monthly fee after the first year only from this review. In case my wife – the user – had some issues that made the Aktiia unhelpful to her alone, I tried to calibrate it for me, but it simply could not do it and refused to calibrate. The £199.99 cost is about that for a private consultation, so as I like to test new technology, it is worth wasting the money. Just. But I couldn’t recommend it to anyone.

By: Mariano Chiusano

Mariano Chiusano — Mon, 17 Jan 2022 23:21:23 +0000

I have been using the Aktiia device for more than a month right now and I am quite satisfied. Initially the device could not take too many measurements a day but then I learnt that I could take more measurements by tightening the device. So now I can take a measurement every two hours when I am not very active. The only thing I noticed is that the measurements are linked to the calibration in the sense that if you calibrate the device in the morning when BP is higher, all readings will be consistently higher than readings obtained when calibration is performed in the evening when BP is lower. This means that even if the device will continue to monitor the excursion during the day, it will show a consistent bias related to the time of the day when the initial calibration was performed. Therefore I suspect that the best data are obtained if the device is calibrated during the afternoon when my BP readings are in the middle of the excursion. Anyway I am learning a lot from my device and how behaviors, diet, sleep can affect your BP. For instance I noticed that caffeine is lowering my average BP even if it increases the punctual value after drinking a coffee. Same thing happen with chocolate. So a moderate consumption of coffee and chocolate would be positive but should be avoided if you are suffering from isolated high BP peaks. Hope you will enjoy this device.

By: Big H

Big H — Thu, 04 Nov 2021 09:18:39 +0000

Check out Cardiex and their new cuff less blood pressure monitoring device….and great App to go with.

By: Marko Maslakovic

Marko Maslakovic — Sun, 03 Oct 2021 11:56:24 +0000

In reply to Steve B Smith. I don't think it's supposed to take BP measurements when you are active. BP is taken at rest. When I tested it, most of my results were for the period when I was sleeping.

By: Steve B Smith

Steve B Smith — Sun, 03 Oct 2021 09:15:11 +0000

My issue is that my BP can vary wildly over the period of a day – 80 points would not be untypical, and it tends to drop when I’m active, so without taking measurements at all times it’s likely to be not very useful.