Smartphone data helps surgeons understand their patients’ postop recovery

Editor's Note

Surgeons can better understand the effect of a patient's postoperative physical activity on their recovery by capturing passively-collected accelerometer data from their patients’ smartphones, finds this study presented October 28 at the American College of Surgeons Clinical Congress 2019 in San Francisco.

Patients enrolled in the study downloaded an app that could capture the accelerometer sensor data from their smartphones. They were told that their activity would be tracked postoperatively. 

Of 62 patients, who were followed for a median of 147 days, 17 experienced a postoperative event. The average daily activity for all patients preoperatively was about 100 minutes per week. Those who experienced a postoperative event had a significantly lower level of daily activity compared with their baseline as well as patients who did not experience an event.

The researchers note that as more patients are enrolled in this ongoing study and as more data is collected, understanding the relationship between a postoperative event and the patient’s activity level will become clearer.