SynthesisJournal of racial and ethnic health disparities2023
Accuracy of Heart Rate Measurement with Wrist-Worn Wearable Devices in Various Skin Tones: a Systematic Review.
Synthesis in Journal of racial and ethnic health disparities, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 53 papers, 4 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
53 citing papers in PubMed, 4 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 71 citations in OpenAlex.
- Consumer-oriented (wearable) sleep technology: a systematic SWOT analysis and recommendations for athletes and fitness enthusiasts.Frontiers in sports and active living · 2026Pooled it
- Atrial fibrillation burden in clinical practice, research, and technology development: a clinical consensus statement of the European Society of Cardiology Council on Stroke and the European Heart Rhythm Association.Europace : European pacing, arrhythmias, and cardiac electrophysiology : journal of the working groups on cardiac pacing, arrhythmias, and cardiac cellular electrophysiology of the European Society of Cardiology · 2025Guideline
- Keeping Pace with Wearables: A Living Umbrella Review of Systematic Reviews Evaluating the Accuracy of Consumer Wearable Technologies in Health Measurement.Sports medicine (Auckland, N.Z.) · 2024Pooled it
- Impact of Skin Pigmentation on Pulse Oximetry Blood Oxygenation and Wearable Pulse Rate Accuracy: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Journal of medical Internet research · 2024Pooled it
- Guidelines for rigor and reproducibility of heart rate variability within human cardiovascular research.American journal of physiology. Heart and circulatory physiology · 2026Review
- Assessing body composition via a smartphone computer vision application: High repeatability but method-dependent agreement compared with BODPOD and Inbody.PLOS digital health · 2026Article
- The Representation of Different Populations in Studies Assessing the Validity of Consumer Wearable Photoplethysmography-Based Measurements: Scoping Review.JMIR mHealth and uHealth · 2026Article
- Atrial Fibrillation Burden: Assessment, Clinical Significance, and Therapeutic Implications.Life (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Laser-Induced Graphene Electrodes for Wrist-Worn Impedance Plethysmography Measurements: A Feasibility Study.Biosensors · 2026Article
- Advances and Challenges in Wearable Sensors for Health Monitoring.ACS applied materials & interfaces · 2026Review
- Can consumer wearables support outpatient health monitoring for patients with post-acute infection syndromes? A systematic umbrella review of accuracy, validity, and clinical utility data.PLOS digital health · 2026Article
- From data to decision: a clinical pipeline for wearable AI in early cardiotoxicity detection.Cardio-oncology (London, England) · 2026Review
- Comparative Validity of Smartwatch-Derived Heart Rate and Energy Expenditure During Endurance and Resistance Exercise.Sensors (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Accuracy of heart rate measurement using AirPods Pro 3 during graded treadmill exercise: A laboratory-based validation study.PLOS digital health · 2026Article
- Testing Multiple Delivery Methods of the Virtual Exercise Games for Youth with T1D Peer Intervention: Protocol Development and Feasibility.Hormone research in paediatrics · 2026Article
- Influence of skin pigmentation on the accuracy and data quality of photoplethysmographic heart rate measurement during exercise.European journal of applied physiology · 2026Article
- The accuracy of Apple Watch measurements: a living systematic review and meta-analysis.NPJ digital medicine · 2026Article
- Performance evaluation of consumer sleep-tracking wearables and nearables in healthy young and older adults.Sleep advances : a journal of the Sleep Research Society · 2026Article
- Advancing health equity in proactive health management: from data underrepresentation and algorithmic bias to a closed-loop governance framework.Frontiers in public health · 2026Review
- Reducing bias and enhancing equity in AI-enabled precision nutrition: addressing measurement error across wearables, multiomics, and dietary data.Frontiers in digital health · 2026Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundWearable consumer technology allows for the collection of a growing amount of personal health data. Through the analysis of reflected LED light on the skin, heart rate measurement and arrhythmia detection can be performed. Given that melanin alters skin light absorption, this study seeks to summarize the accuracy of cardiac data from wrist-worn wearable devices for participants of varying skin tones.
methodsWe conducted a systematic review, searching Embase, MEDLINE, CINAHL, and Cochrane for original studies that stratified heart rate and rhythm data for consumer wearable technology according to participant race and/or skin tone.
resultsA total of 10 studies involving 469 participants met inclusion criteria. The frequency-weighted Fitzpatrick score for skin tone was reported in six studies (n = 293), with a mean participant score of 3.5 (range 1-6). Overall, four of the ten studies reported a significant reduction in accuracy of heart rate measurement with wearable devices in darker-skinned individuals, compared to participants with lighter skin tones. Four studies noted no effect of user skin tone on accuracy. The remaining two studies showed mixed results.
conclusionsPreliminary evidence is inconclusive, but some studies suggest that wearable devices may be less accurate for detecting heart rate in participants with darker skin tones. Higher quality evidence is necessary, with larger sample sizes and more objective stratification of participants by skin tone, in order to characterize potential racial bias in consumer devices.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.