When Chris Mint went about his ordinary day, he used his Apple Watch as a regular, nevertheless hi-tech, companion. Heart rate monitoring, OLED displays and all that were great, but it was still a pleasant surprise for him when one odd day it saved his life by detecting some leaky heart valves.
“Best money I’ve ever spent,” he said to the UK newspaper Daily Sun when his experience became famous. A fitness enthusiast, Mint had no idea that he had a heart problem until his watch pointed out that he showed symptoms of Afib. When he headed to his primary care doctor to follow up on this, they said that atrial defibrillation seemed unlikely, at least for him. However, a subsequent and extensive electrocardiogram (ECG) proved them wrong by detecting him with not one but two leaky valves.
Had the watch not been there, Mint might have had a heart attack or a stroke said his doctors treating him after the diagnosis. Mint hadn’t ever suspected he would have this, and even his doctors were surprised of the results. He will now be operated by doctors specialising in this, to repair the faulty valves.
Afib conditions are irregularities in the heart’s beating, which could be due to blockages, failure or as also in this case, valve leakage. Apple watches have time and over carried a heart rate sensor, which Mint had been using for at least the last two years according to what he told reporters.
A resident of Lincolnshire, the 30-year-old works as a project manager and has a family, with two children. After the incident, Mint’s wife Tiffany wrote to Apple’s CEO Tim Cook narrating the experience. Cook responded to her saying,” I’m glad your husband sought treatment and is fine now. Thanks for sharing his story — it inspires us to keep pushing forward.”
