Two years ago, in September 2022, Apple launched the second generation of AirPods Pro, powered by the new H2 chip, featuring enhanced Active Noise Cancellation and improvements in spatial audio. We are due for the third generation launch of the AirPods Pro and it is widely believed that the upcoming AirPods will feature health and wellness features.
There are multiple pathways via which novel health monitoring techniques could be embedded into earbuds. This could be using deployment of new in-ear PPG sensors or sophisticated algorithms or a combination of both.
- Apple’s new research shows that Respiratory Rate can be monitored using AirPods or wearables with Audio.
- Could Apple’s next AirPods analyze your brain signals?
Mark Gurman from Bloomberg suggested last year that the next AirPods Pro will feature body temperature sensing and hearing aid support. Apart from it, we believe Apple is going to emphasize ‘Respiratory Rate’ monitoring along with more mindfulness-based wellness approaches to stress management such as the MBSR. (Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction).
We strongly believe that consumers are going to see a combination of advanced sensors and sophisticated machine learning that will allow users to track a key vital sign, the Respiratory Rate. (RR).
Respiratory rate is a fundamental vital sign that is sensitive to different pathological conditions (e.g., adverse cardiac events, pneumonia, and clinical deterioration) and stressors, including emotional stress, cognitive load, heat, cold, physical effort, and exercise-induced fatigue.
RR is often called the third vital sign after temperature and heart rate.
Apple’s numerous research and Collaboration efforts
Apple’s machine learning research team has been busy figuring out how to effectively measure respiratory rate using wearables and particularly from speech collected from devices.
Our hypothesis around the upcoming Apple health monitoring feature on AirPods is centered on two very popular research papers published by Apple Machine Learning Researchers.
The latest paper, published this month (July 2024), “ Pre-Trained Foundation Model Representations to Uncover Breathing Patterns in Speech” from Vikramjit Mitra, an experienced Apple Machine Learning researcher with Speech-Audio Biosignals background and his team offers clues.
The latest paper calls out “This work investigates a machine-learning based approach to estimate RR from speech segments obtained from subjects speaking to a close-talking microphone device.”
Additionally according to Apple’s researchers, “Respiratory rate (RR) is a vital metric that is used to assess the overall health, fitness, and general well-being of an individual. Existing approaches to measure RR (number of breaths one takes in a minute) are performed using specialized equipment or training. Studies have demonstrated that machine learning algorithms can be used to estimate RR using bio-sensor signals as input.”
This is not Apple’s first attempt at closely looking into approaches for determining Respiratory Rate from speech.
Apple’s Researchers examined the overarching hypothesis way back in 2021 and presented their findings in a paper termed “ Estimating Respiratory Rate From Breath Audio Obtained Through Wearable Microphones”.
The fundamental belief held was that Remote estimation of RR offers a cost-effective method to track disease progression and cardio-respiratory fitness over time.
MBSR based Wellness industry collaboration
The thinking around Respiratory Rate and its overarching impact to wellness was emphasized in a collaboration effort between Apple’s Researchers and Healthy minds Innovation Inc. in 2023.
The collaboration findings resulted in a very popular paper that examined the impact of MBSR (Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction) on Respiratory Rate.
Mind–body interventions, such as mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR), may improve well-being by increasing awareness and regulation of physiological and cognitive states. MBSR has become very popular over the last few years.
Healthcare providers and wellness centers across the country are now offering MBSR programs to meet the increasing demand.
The collaborative paper “Slower Respiration Rate is Associated with Higher Self-reported Well-being After Wellness Training” was published in October 2023. Healthy Minds Innovation inc.’s Dr. Richard Davidson and his team are well known in the space of Wellness research.
Apple’s research papers along with their wellness industry collaborations clearly suggest that we are going to see an emphasis on simple yet profound health metrics such as the Respiratory Rate in the next generation AirPods Pro. This is in addition to other features such as hearing aid support and body temperature monitoring, that were reported by Mark Gurman last year.
