LAS VEGAS — Who ever thought a blood-pressure monitor could look cool?
Qardio did. The U.S. medical device maker is obsessed with crafting hospital-grade gear that wouldn’t look out of place sitting alongside your iMac.
The company’s latest product, unveiled during the International CES trade show here, is a smart scale that delivers feedback in the form of a smile or a frown, depending on how your weight is trending.
“It makes you feel good,” said Rosario Iannella, Qardio’s chief information officer.
Just as with the current boom in fitness trackers, Qardio’s approach to medical devices is geared toward getting people to pay more attention to their health. By making the devices attractive and easy to use, and making the data they gather simple to share with medical professionals, the company hopes to get individuals more involved in their health care. The devices work with Qardio’s iOS and Android devices, but also link to HealthKit, Apple’s new platform for collating medical and fitness data.
Qardio’s portable blood-pressure device, the $99 QardioArm, is about as big as a king-size Snickers bar and comes in several candy-colored options. It’s less bulky than the usual blood-pressure cuffs, and Qardio claims it’s more accurate as well.
“If it’s coming from our device, the doctor can trust that,” Iannella told Cult of Mac.
It also tracks the location where the blood-pressure measurement was taken, which seems slightly bizarre. But Iannella said the location data can help patients and doctors identify things that might be causing them harmful stress.
If, for instance, your job or your weekly visits to your in-laws are causing your blood pressure to spike, you might want to perform a little lifestyle adjustment.
“It gives you more insight, and based on that you can change your behavior,” Iannella said.
The company’s range of devices are also designed to be comfortable and appealing enough that patients use them more often. QardioCore, a $449 wearable EKG/ECG monitor coming this spring, does away with the traditional sticky pads and wires of devices that gather heart data. Instead, the futuristic-looking white device simply straps across the wearer’s chest.
The QardioBase smart scale, which will be available for $149 this spring, also boasts some features that make it unique from similar devices. A pregnancy mode takes into account the special needs of expectant mothers. And the acrylic material the scale is made of isn’t cold and forbidding like the usual glass or steel construction, which Iannella said makes the whole experience a little more human.
“When you touch it, it’s warm,” he said.
