Translated by Seung Yeon Woo
Written by Hyun Cheon Kim


Recently, the Korean version of a medical application, ‘HeartTracker’, has been released and Korean Americans are now able to check their health condition easily. People can measure their heart rate with a simple touch of a fingertip on the camera lens of a smartphone.

Also, they can save their heart rate records daily and e-mail the record to their doctors. The application is to give people more convenience by decreasing time, cost, and effort of both hospitals and patients.

ConnectGencyInc (President Dong-jun Kye), in Worcester, and a Life Sciences professor at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Ki-hoonCheon, cooperated to research and invent the application. After about a year of development, they released it on the App Store at the end of September.

Based on the data about humans’ health condition and heart rate that professor Cheon has been researching for many years, the people of ConnectGency Inc. invented a program that works as an iPhone application.

There is a similar application to ‘HeartTracker’ already on the App Store; however, according to president Kye of ConnectGency Inc., ‘HeartTracker’ has less than a 3% error rate.The application has been approved based on the outcome of thorough clinical tests.

How the application works is quite complicated but the actual use is simple and easy.
The application measures heart rate by sensing the color of blood vessels that changes depending on blood flow through capillaries. When a user puts a fingertip on the camera lens for a few seconds, the algorithm that the team invented measures the automatic color change of capillaries and finally the result appears on the designed interface.

Unlike the previous heart rate measuring applications, ‘HeartTracker’ provides the heart rate right away and it also givesinformation about safe and risk range of heart rate depending on gender and age.

The application allows one to save measurement records by day, week, and month, and it makes adiagram to show how one’s heart rate changes over time as well. If there is any unusual symptom or consideration while measuring heart rate, one can save as memos and send the records and notes easily to family and doctors through e-mail.

Moreover, it calculates calorie consumption after exercise and appropriate exercise intensity based on the user’s heart condition.

Also, up to three people cansign up for profiles and it will be beneficial foryoung adultsto sign up for their parents and check their health.

The application now contains five languages including English and Korean and elderly people are expected to use it easily.

Additonally, ConnectGency Inc. and professor Cheon have finished working on the application that measures atrial fibrillation and are waiting for the approval of the FDA.

According to president Kye, “I’m expecting to see a lot of people using medical applications on smartphones to take care of their own health condition more enthusiastically, and also as heart disease is the #1 cause of death, more different kinds of applications that measure heart rate and arrhythmiawill bring about medical application innovations.

‘HeartTracker’ is $2.99 and available on the U.S. App Store and Korea App Store.

(U.S. App Store: http://itunes.apple.com/app/hearttracker/id560649391?mt=8)
(Korea App Store:http://itunes.apple.com/kr/app/hearttracker/id560649391?mt=8)

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ⓒ 보스톤코리아(http://www.bostonkorea.com), 무단전재 및 재배포 금지