New Cardiovascular Age and Cardio Capacity
capabilities further establish ŌURA as a personal health companion
for improving healthspan and longevity
ŌURA, maker of Oura Ring, the most accurate and trusted smart
ring, announced the launch of two new heart health features:
Cardiovascular Age (CVA) and Cardio Capacity. The two product
advancements signal the next evolution of ŌURA, furthering its
expansion from a best-in-class sleep tracker to a comprehensive
health device and personal health companion, making holistic health
more accessible.
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“At ŌURA, we know that health is not a moment in time or season;
it’s a lifelong journey,” said Holly Shelton, chief product officer
at ŌURA. “We’re dedicated to creating, validating, and offering new
and innovative product offerings that give our members context
about their health over the long term. Along with providing
continuous, accurate data, health technology needs to answer the
critical ‘so what?’ question. We’re connecting the dots to help our
members understand how their habits and behaviors today—like
aerobic activity and sleep hygiene—impact their health as they age
and how they can make changes that will pay off later in life.”
Heart disease remains the leading cause of death globally,
responsible for a third of all deaths. Because cardiovascular and
heart disease can present in a variety of ways—including disorders
of the heart and blood vessels like coronary heart disease, heart
attacks and strokes, cerebrovascular disease, chronic kidney
disease, and other conditions—it can be difficult for people to
understand the state of their heart health and take preventative
steps before an unwanted health event like a heart attack or
stroke.
ŌURA’s heart health features work together to combine
information about estimated arterial stiffness and VO2Max to give
ŌURA members an indication of their cardiovascular health and the
potential implications on their long-term health.
Cardiovascular Age
Cardiovascular Age helps ŌURA members understand their estimated
cardiovascular age relative to their chronological age, helping
them identify behaviors that can positively impact their health
span. ŌURA gauges CVA by analyzing age-related observations within
a photoplethysmograph (PPG) signal, which carries information about
estimated arterial stiffness and pulse wave velocity (PWV).
CVA provides a quick, easy-to-digest look at how a person’s
vascular system may be aging and what that could mean for long-term
health.
How it works:
After an ŌURA Member has used the Oura App for at least 14 days,
they will see a CVA metric that indicates if they are trending
below, above, or in alignment (within 5 years) of their
chronological age.
Cardio Capacity
Cardio Capacity is based on an estimation of VO2Max, which is a
measure of the maximum amount of oxygen an individual can use
during intense or effortful exercise. It is a well-known benchmark
of aerobic endurance, reflecting the efficiency of the body's
cardiovascular and respiratory systems in supplying oxygen to the
muscles during sustained physical activity. In simple terms, the
better a person’s cardio capacity, the healthier their
cardiovascular system (and organs) will likely be across a
lifetime.
With the launch of this feature, ŌURA aims to reposition VO2Max
from a sports metric to a benchmark of health span and longevity.
It reveals how well your heart, lungs, blood vessels, muscles, and
nervous system all work together. For most members, a high VO2Max
is likely to be correlated with an “aligned” or “lower” CVA.
How it works:
To use this feature, ŌURA members will be prompted to take a
walking test to establish a baseline VO2Max that is translated to
Cardio Capacity. Traditionally, VO2Max is measured in a lab using
specialty equipment that is inaccessible, both physically and
financially, for most of the population. ŌURA’s approach is a
purposeful departure from that method; it’s more accessible for
more people (i.e., not just elite athletes), providing insights
that extend beyond performance.
“Prioritizing cardiovascular health is crucial for extending
healthspan, as it supports physical vitality and resilience, and
reduces the risk of chronic diseases,” said Dr. Shyamal Patel,
senior vice president of science at ŌURA. “In partnership with
board-certified cardiologists and scientists at research
institutions like the Kuopio Research Institute of Exercise
Medicine (KULTU) and the University of California, Los Angeles,
along with ŌURA's medical advisory board, we have rigorously
developed our science and algorithms to ensure these features
deliver accurate insights for ŌURA's wide-ranging and diverse
member base. We’re committed to continued investment and
development in heart health and look forward to continued expansion
in this critical area.”
Establishing heart health as a core focus area, ŌURA aims for
future iterations of Cardio Capacity to integrate into larger
holistic health views in the ŌURA App, demonstrating the
relationship between changes in Cardio Capacity and CVA, or how
these outcomes may change Activity and Readiness trends over
time.
Expected Outcomes
The goal of these new features is to address health
holistically, with the understanding that each part of a person’s
physiology is inextricably intertwined. While CVA and Cardio
Capacity are heart health features, both have implications for
multiple organ systems. CVA estimates the stiffening of large
arteries, which has direct effects on the heart and also other
major organs including the brain and kidneys. As a result, both CVA
and Cardio Capacity are much more than heart health features, they
are comprehensive health span insights.
Importantly, ŌURA provides actionable insights to help members
change or maintain CVA, depending on their goals. ŌURA shares
weekly and monthly insights into how CVA and Cardio Capacity
metrics are trending, offering strategies to sleep, move, and
de-stress better. These insights can be useful for individuals as
well as clinicians, research institutions, and more. For healthcare
professionals and researchers, ŌURA’s heart health features can
provide valuable data for patient care, clinical assessments, and
research studies, and for human performance teams in sports and
military settings, they can help athletes and personnel optimize
training and performance based on cardiovascular health
metrics.
“A better understanding of heart health and cardiovascular
capacity is critical to long-term health,” said Dr. Jag Singh,
cardiologist and professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.
“Wearables are uniquely positioned to give people a non-invasive
and simple way to understand how they are doing cardiovascularly
before they require intervention. The power of wearables in
prevention and longevity is undeniable. While not a replacement for
gold-standard lab tests, they can fill an important gap in
accessibility and usability for people at scale.”
In addition, ŌURA has announced that it has joined the American
Heart Association Center for Health Technology & Innovation’s
(the Center) Innovators’ Network. The Center is focused on building
and fostering health technology relationships to develop innovative
and scalable solutions.
The Innovators’ Network is a healthcare technology consortium
that connects entrepreneurs, providers, researchers, and payers.
Members collaborate with the Center in different ways, including
the building of models for clinical outcome studies, lowering the
significant cost of developing those studies independently, helping
connect the science to technology, and providing evidence that a
digital platform improves healthcare outcomes – a key concern for
providers and payers.
Cardiovascular Age and Cardio Capacity are rolling out to ŌURA
members in late May 2024 and will be available on Oura Ring Gen3
devices on both Android and iOS.
For more information, visit Ouraring.com.
About ŌURA:
ŌURA is the company behind Oura Ring—the smart ring that
delivers personalized health data, insights, and daily guidance.
With sleep as its foundation, Oura Membership fosters healthy
habits to make wellness and recovery a mindful, daily practice.
Validated against medical gold standards and driven by continuous
monitoring of individual biometrics, the lightweight and
comfortable Oura Ring is one of the most accurate wearables
available. For organizations, Oura For Business connects individual
well-being with collective outcomes by making performance
measurable, actionable, and attainable. Founded in Finland with
offices in Oulu, Helsinki, San Francisco, and San Diego, ŌURA has
raised more than $350 million and is valued at $2.55 billion. For
more information, please visit http://ouraring.com/.
Oura Ring is not a medical device and is not intended to
diagnose, treat, cure, monitor, or prevent medical
conditions/illnesses.
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version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20240510769393/en/
Ali Deasy, ŌURA alison.deasy@ouraring.com press@ouraring.com