Digital wearables such as the Apple Watch, Fitbit, and smart rings are the trendy side of preventative healthcare, and their use has increased dramatically since 2021.
We looked at this in “Connected Wellness: What’s Next In The Connected Economy,” a study featuring research funded by CareCredit. We polled over 3,200 consumers in the United States to learn about their efforts to prevent health concerns, with an emphasis on the use of digital technology.
Digital wearables such as the Apple Watch, Fitbit, and smart rings are the trendy side of preventative healthcare, and their use has increased dramatically since 2021.
We investigated this in “Connected Wellness: What’s Next In The Connected Economy,” a paper based on research supported by CareCredit. We polled over 3,200 consumers in the United States to find out what efforts they made.
We discovered that 10 million more U.S. consumers started using websites and wearables just nine months before August 2022, leading us to the conclusion that 148 million U.S. consumers — or nearly 44% of the whole U.S. population — are now using some type of preventative digital healthcare technology.
The research notes that 31% of consumers reported utilizing websites or apps to assist their mental health in August, “up 32% from November 2021,” with COVID-19 probably definitely playing a role in the somewhat abrupt increase in healthcare wearables and web tools. This is by far the activity connected to preventative health that has had the biggest rise.
Though 75% of customers who are most connected say they used at least one in August, it’s interesting to see that they utilize mental healthcare apps the least. Compare that to November 2021, when just 45% of integrated tech customers used mental health-related applications while 75% of them wore wearables.
According to the report, “this demonstrates the widespread and quickly growing demand among integrated tech customers for various preventative healthcare devices.”
