Forbes: Data. Data. Data. How Can Wearables Really Help Us?

Forbes recently interviewed Brennan Spiegel, MD, MSHS, director of Health Services Research at Cedars-Sinai, about how remote patient monitoring and wearable technology can help clinicians detect health problems earlier.

Spiegel told Forbes that understanding a patient’s health requires insight into daily life beyond the clinic.

“Patients spend 99.9% of their lives nowhere near the clinic,” he said. “If we’re truly going to understand health, we need a way to learn what happens between office visits, not just during them. That has always been the promise of remote patient monitoring.”

While wearable data has long been available, Spiegel told Forbes the challenge has been turning that information into meaningful clinical action. He said advances in AI, paired with HIPAA-compliant data sharing and patient consent, are helping make that possible.

“Rather than overwhelming clinicians with a constant stream of data, AI can help identify meaningful patterns and ‘hot spot’ patients who may need more timely attention,” he said. “The goal isn’t more data—it’s better, more proactive care.”

Spiegel told Forbes that Cedars-Sinai has spent more than a decade integrating wearable biosensor data into the electronic health record, though he emphasized that establishing that connection is only a first step.

“The larger challenge is developing clinical workflows that make these data genuinely useful without creating additional burden for clinicians,” he said.

Spiegel told Forbes his team is now focused on evidence-based care models that integrate wearable data into routine clinical practice while improving outcomes, enhancing efficiency and supporting clinicians.

Read the complete article from Forbes.