Wearables like Fitbits and Apple Watches are already helping people keep track of their health, but now researchers are exploring using wearable devices to address larger health concerns — like combating the opioid epidemic.
Researchers from the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester are using E4 Empatica wearable to track when drug addicts relapse. It measures temperature, heartbeat, motion, and skin electrical conductance at a rate of 30 times per second.
Tracking the time addicts tend to relapse and the effect it has on their bodies can help doctors and sponsors refine their intervention methods, Stephanie Carreiro, a medical toxicologist who has led two separate studies on the wearable, told Tech Insider.
The researchers are now looking for different physiological symptoms the wearable can pick up that may indicate a relapse is about to happen. If that's possible, the wearable could then send an alert to a contact approved by the user, like a sponsor or doctor, so that they can reach out to the addict before a relapse occurs.
"Substance abuse happens when patients are out of our reach... often when folks go back into their environment," Carreiro said. "This gives us a way to get contextual information and figure out what the triggers around them are."
The use of opioids, both legal prescription drugs like Oxycontin and illegal ones like heroin, were involved in 60% of deaths from drug overdoses, according to a January report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The high amount of drug overdoses has led the federal government to dub opioid abuse an epidemic.
In one already published study, Carreiro tracked 15 cocaine users wearing the wristband to see if they would be willing to keep it on. The study found that everyone was compliant; users were even interested in seeing the data the wearable collected. It was also able to detect when a patient used cocaine 100% of the time.
When users take cocaine, their skin temperature drops and their skin electrical conductance "skyrockets," Carreiro said. Cocaine users are also more agitated when on the drug, and the wearable can pick up on excess movement.
Cocaine, however, is different from opiates like heroin or morphine. With those drugs, users' movement slows and skin temperature increases. Carreiro is currently conducting research to see if the wearable can track and perhaps predict relapses with opioids like it seems to be able to do with cocaine.
The wearable can store 60 hours worth of data and upload everything to the cloud over Bluetooth. It can charge in less than two hours.
But the device is meant to be used by drug addicts who want to recover. Carreiro said the wearable should never be used as a punishment or be forced on someone, but should help people who are trying to get better and want someone to see how their recovery is progressing.
"People say 'drug addicts will never wear this' and it won't work as a court-ordered device," Carreiro said. "The technology will only work if they want it."
