This is ridiculous, if such a device exists and can detect a new condition that 5% of the US population has with a 80% false positive rate, and the condition was as serious as heart disease this would really be a miracle device and people would be grateful that such a thing exists.

I really have distaste for those comments that attempt to mask ideology with a veneer of logic. You attempt to use a limiting case argument that actually proves the original comment's argument and then end with rhetoric about how the healthcare system is being flooded already. That may be true, but that isn't relevant to the utility of the apple watch in this scenario.

> This is ridiculous, if such a device exists and can detect a new condition that 5% of the US population has with a 80% false positive rate, and the condition was as serious as heart disease this would really be a miracle device and people would be grateful that such a thing exists.

Since we're overly simplifying, there _are_ devices that can detect conditions that 5% of the population has _and_ have far fewer false positives - X-rays, CT scans, MRI. In the grand scheme amazing things, but no-one's calling them "miracle devices".

> there _are_ devices that can detect conditions that 5% of the population has _and_ have far fewer false positives - X-rays, CT scans, MRI.

Perhaps, but you can't wear one on your wrist and you generally have to be quite sure something is wrong first.

Oh, but they are miracle devices, and were considered as such initially. But the difference between them and the hypothetical miracle device is accessibility. MRIs and CT scans are not something you can use to casually test half of the country's population.

You might be right in an ideal world, but in reality there are significant resource constraints on healthcare.

What would be more likely to happen in that scenario, is that so many people would be seeking care that the 5% who were positive would be unlikely to even get the care they need.

Further, such an influx would have knock-on effects on unrelated patients, whose care would suffer due to the severe lack of resources.

This is all magnified if the resource is not a general practice physician, but a specialist.

Wait - but if I'm reading the article correctly, it's not the case that all these people are flooding the ER, requiring urgent care. An alert pops up, a person is concerned, they decide to schedule a visit to their doctor.

If the healthcare system - paid healthcare system - can't handle a slow baseline increase in non-emergency visits, then something is seriously wrong with this picture.

That really does sound like ideology cloaked in common sense. Demand for great healthcare is already essentially infinite no matter what new technology comes along, and we need a sane way to deal with that. Pointing fingers at the demand side is a common diversionary tactic.

> Further, such an influx would have knock-on effects on unrelated patients, whose care would suffer due to the severe lack of resources.

Hypothetically, let's assume over a long period of time new devices are alerting users to possible medical conditions. Those appointments are paid for (I'm guessing). Will that money not fund more availability over time? The supply of doctors is not supposed to be fixed.

The study started with 767,338 patients with clinical notes.

Out of that haystack, only 41 referred to an Apple Watch alert about abnormal pulse detection.

And of that 7 were found to have enough concern to further explore potential cardiovascular disease.

So, out of three quarters of a million visits, there were 41 with concerns from an Apple Watch, and 7 people received early treatment they might not have otherwise received (which could potentially save millions of dollars of future healthcare costs).

34 people were false positives and inconvenienced with a doctor's visit.

This seems like a net positive.

Since you're feeling judgmental ("How can you utterly fail to see a problem..."), let's take it the other extreme.

Suppose a device is released that has a 30% false positive rate: two-thirds of the people it identifies have an actual underlying condition that requires treatment.

Presumably you would not be opposed to this. (If you do, you'd seem to be opposed to any effort to catch conditions early.)

So then we're at a discussion about what the correct percentage of false positives is for a further diagnostic - in this case, likely a holter monitor, to identify if it's an actual issue, which is not that expensive.

You believe it's obvious that ten percent is an outrageous number. But if the next step is a fairly inexpensive diagnostic, and the subject matter is a potentially lethal condition (often the case with hearts), it's not obvious at all.

What's your acceptable "brightline" of maximum false positivity to warrant additional diagnostic? Fifty percent? Twenty percent?

I'm going to risk going against the zeitgeist and expose myself to a bunch of downvotes right now.

But what you described sounds reminiscent of the PCR test we have for COVID right now. I at least hope many are aware of this here.

> I'm going to risk going against the zeitgeist and expose myself to a bunch of downvotes right now.

It’s off topic, but I recommend you do it. I’ve found HN to be a great place for those types of discussions provided you have a relatively thick skin and don’t engage in hostility.

> A new device is created that alerts 50% of the US population that they have a condition that needs to be treated. Only 10% of those cases warranted further action.

This just improved the lives of 16 million people. That is not insignificant. And that's assuming 16 million people would have the same condition.

This also might be underestimating the number of false positives doctors already deal with and that these devices may actually lower that number.

That's an unrealistic scenario since 5% (10% of 50%) of the population doesn't have an otherwise difficult to detect and life threatening condition. And if they did, then there is a serious problem and we would expect the hospitals to be overrun.