Need help understanding heart rate monitoring

[Alessandro Guida]

After synchronizing the Band 2 with MS Health on a 930 I see different heart rate monitoring data reported by the "steps" or "calories" screens compared to the "excercise" screen. While the excercise screen clearly shows peaks at over 100 bpm, the steps or calories screens do not show anything above 80 bpm for the same period of time. Is there any good explanation for this? It is troubling that heart rate peaks during the day (not while excercising) are not recorded. That reduces a lot the value of the band2 as health monitoring device.

 

[Nate Silver]

When not in exercise or activity mode, the Band is not sampling anywhere near as often. In exercise mode, it's sampling every second, for the entire duration of the activity. In sleep tracking mode, it records two minutes on, eight minutes off. At other times (during plain 24 hr tracking) it is one minute on, nine minutes off. So there are a couple of reasons why you don't see any peaks; first being that they may have occurred 'off-cycle', when the sensor wasn't recording, and second being that because of the longer time scale being displayed, the chart is going to be smoother in appearance.

Its the only way to do 24 hour hr monitoring with a battery that is small enough to sit on your wrist. You can put your Band in exercise or run mode and leave it there for your whole day, but the battery will be flat within three hours or so. It might also be arguable that over a 24 hour span, whatever random peaks might appear are statistically irrelevant, and may in fact be considered more 'noise' than data of value.

 

[DroidUser42]

When not in exercise or activity mode, the Band is not sampling anywhere near as often. In exercise mode, it's sampling every second, for the entire duration of the activity. In sleep tracking mode, it records two minutes on, eight minutes off. At other times (during plain 24 hr tracking) it is one minute on, nine minutes off. So there are a couple of reasons why you don't see any peaks; first being that they may have occurred 'off-cycle', when the sensor wasn't recording, and second being that because of the longer time scale being displayed, the chart is going to be smoother in appearance.

Its the only way to do 24 hour hr monitoring with a battery that is small enough to sit on your wrist. You can put your Band in exercise or run mode and leave it there for your whole day, but the battery will be flat within three hours or so. It might also be arguable that over a 24 hour span, whatever random peaks might appear are statistically irrelevant, and may in fact be considered more 'noise' than data of value.

Those numbers are correct for Band 1. I haven't heard for sure if they are unchanged for Band 2.

However, I think his question is why isn't "exercise" data showing in the "daily" data.

Looking at the daily data, it appears the data is the average HR for the hour. Perhaps averaging the 30 minute exercise over the hour lowers the results to the daily graph.

 

[Alessandro Guida]

Thanks for the answers. At least now I understand the logic, even I am not sure I agree with it. A pity that the sampling interval is not configurable and that the data captured in excercise mode is wasted instead of reusing it for a more accurate daily data.
Brg.

 

[indiW]

This is one of my assumptions, that the team/s behind MS band has little or no experience in health, fitness, sciences, neither they have consulted or done adequate research covering above with a view to get the best out of the band.
I just have a feeling they have just put some device together so MS is in the wearable market sector.

Posted via the Windows Central App for Android

 

[devbent]

Thanks for the answers. At least now I understand the logic, even I am not sure I agree with it. A pity that the sampling interval is not configurable and that the data captured in excercise mode is wasted instead of reusing it for a more accurate daily data.
Brg.

Hi Alessandro!

How exactly we take the exercise data and summarize that on the daily graph changed a few times during development. I actually agree with you that showing peak heart rate is a great way to celebrate a how hard the user worked out! However the idea behind showing the average is that for a given time frame, the average heart rate provides an overall better summary of how hard one's heart was working. (Previously when we showed peaks, people complained about how running up stairs ruined their graph!)

If you visit your Health Dashboard you can your heart rate averaged out into 30 minute intervals across the day, providing a bit better granularity.