Tech And Apps For Your Blood Pressure Monitoring

People with high blood pressure often sit with that cuff device, waiting for the device to squeeze, hoping the reading is clear. Missing a check or misplacing a note is easy, and the numbers only show one moment in time.

The Hilo Band is doing more to improve that process. The certified medical device gathers roughly 25 measurements every day and night and sends them to the linked app. Instead of hunting through paper notes, wearers see a running chart that links readings to stress, meals, medicines and movement.

Head of Hilo’s medical team Dr Jay Shah explained that the band lets patients, doctors and carers watch changes in real time and pinpoint causes for sudden rises, making treatment changes faster and clearer.

 

How Are Wearables Changing Daily Care?

 

Hilo’s wrist strap is part of a growing move toward cuff-free gadgets that sit on the body all day. The makers promise painless use, simple setup, free shipping and a 2 year warranty, giving users an entry into regular monitoring without clinic visits.

Scottish company Novosound is taking the idea one stage further. It has built the first ultrasonic blood pressure monitor that can fit inside a watch or ring and still match the accuracy of an electronic cuff, according to the team.

Founder Dave Hughes said that reading pressure through ultrasound, without a cuff, marks an advance for global health.

Novosound plans to show the miniature sensor at CES 2025 in Las Vegas after closing a £2 million funding round led by Par Equity, Kelvin Capital, the University of the West of Scotland and Scottish Enterprise.

 

What Can A Phone Help With Here?

 

For many people the phone is already the health control panel, and the free SmartBP app builds on that habit.

SmartBP lets users type in readings or pull data from any monitor that talks to Apple Health or Google Fit. The app flags each result as normal, low or high the instant it lands on the screen.

More than 50 000 users have left 5-star reviews. Comments are happy with things like the clear graphs and the way the app spots patterns such as isolated diastolic hypertension.

Tags for meals, exercise and medicine help the app draw links between daily life and pressure changes. The correlation screen shows the line between systolic and diastolic values, helping users see whether both numbers improve together.

When a check up comes around, a PDF or CSV report can be sent straight from the phone to the clinician. The developer says the system follows HIPAA and GDPR rules and does not sell health data.

 

 

How Is Constant Data Changing Doctor Visits?

 

Round the clock data recording changes the way conversations start in the clinic. Instead of guessing how breakfast or late-night emails influence readings, a patient can scroll through 25 daily points from the Hilo Band and show clear peaks and troughs.

SmartBP builds on that foundation with weekly and monthly charts. Users who tag each reading learn, for example, that a brisk walk steadies the top number for the next two hours.

One reviewer called KittyBeth wrote that the app uncovered diastolic hypertension, a trait she would not have spotted without the insights screen.

Another user, Nise316, shared a SmartBP report with her doctor while adjusting medication, saving time during follow-up appointments.

Developers of glucose sensors such as Abbott’s FreeStyle Libre show how remote data can be shared with carers and friends through the LibreLinkUp app. The same model of cloud dashboards is now guiding blood pressure services, letting families watch readings at school or at work.

Clinicians already use LibreView to study sugar trends… cardiology teams expect comparable portals for pressure so they can tweak treatment plans without waiting for the next in person session.

 

Where Is The Research Taking Wearable Pressure Tech?

 

Novosound’s Slanj platform is designed for far more than pressure alone. The team believes the same ultrasound wafer can track hydration, muscle health and even recognise hand gestures in later wearables.

The company presented real-world accuracy data at the IEEE International Ultrasonics Symposium in Taipei, showing that the watch-sized sensor can run inside a busy shopping complex as well as in a lab.

Cardiovascular conditions hit more than half a billion people and caused over 20 million deaths in 2021, the World Heart Federation said in the report quoted by Novosound. Cutting out cuffs could help more of those people catch problems early.

Investors have taken notice, with some such as Par Equity having led a £2 million round while Kelvin Capital, the University of the West of Scotland and Scottish Enterprise also backed the plan to bring the sensor to market.

Paul Munn said Novosound is gaining attention from large technology brands and that commercial openings could grow in digital health and equipment monitoring.

Kelvin Capital director John McNicol added that the ultrasonic stack is driving progress across healthcare and factory settings and that the new funding keeps the team on its growth streak.

University of the West of Scotland principal Professor James Miller called the spinout a flagship example of academic ideas moving into the real world, especially as the region has a long legacy of ultrasound research.