January 31, 2025
Everyone knows the sensation: You’re extra drained than ordinary, you’ll be able to solely breathe out of 1 aspect of your nostril, you’ll be able to’t cease coughing and your head is throbbing.
Yep, you’re most likely getting sick — and a few of the metrics measured by your appropriate Garmin smartwatch may echo the way you’re feeling.
First issues first: Your Garmin smartwatch shouldn’t be a medical gadget. Your watch can’t let you know in case you’re sick, and you shouldn’t use it to find out in case you’re sick. For those who’re nervous about your well being, you must discuss to a physician. Garmin smartwatches and the information they supply should not supposed to diagnose, deal with, treatment or stop any illness.
Nonetheless, understanding how your physique may react while you’re sick will be useful.
What occurs while you’re sick?
Not everybody’s physique works the identical method, and a few illnesses and circumstances might have an effect on how the physique reacts to sickness. Usually, on the onset of getting sick, your physique begins an immune response to assist struggle off the sickness and recuperate. This immune response might place your physique underneath stress.
Your physique’s autonomic nervous system (ANS) regulates a wide range of automated features together with your heartbeat, in response to Cleveland Clinic. The ANS is the umbrella over the sympathetic (fight-or-flight stress response) and parasympathetic (relaxation and digest) nervous techniques. These techniques have an effect on your coronary heart charge and coronary heart charge variability (HRV), which is the various time between heartbeats.
A sympathetic nervous system response might imply your physique is underneath stress. Stress and train might increase your coronary heart charge, which may trigger your HRV to drop. For those who get a fever, for instance, your physique might begin an immune response and grow to be burdened. Even a slight improve in physique temperature can increase your coronary heart charge by 7 beats per minute, in response to a examine revealed within the Nationwide Library of Drugs. Research additionally discovered an affiliation between numerous infections and decrease HRV ranges and elevated coronary heart charge.
When your parasympathetic nervous system takes over, your physique could also be resting and recovering. This might trigger your coronary heart charge to go down and your HRV to extend.
What Garmin metrics are based mostly on HRV?
Garmin watches monitor a wide range of well being and health metrics, together with HRV1. Your coronary heart charge and HRV are associated to your sleep, stress degree and Physique Battery™ metrics in your appropriate Garmin watch.
Garmin sleep coach1, for instance, makes use of your HRV — in addition to your age, exercise historical past, sleep historical past and naps — to suggest how a lot sleep you want. Decrease HRV ranges could also be an indication you want extra sleep that will help you recuperate.
With Garmin stress monitoring1 estimated by the Firstbeat Analytics™ engine, you can also make sense of your coronary heart charge and HRV knowledge by studying how your physique responds to completely different stressors.
In case your Physique Battery is struggling to cost, for instance, it might be since you’ve elevated your bodily exercise, you haven’t slept effectively, you drank alcohol, otherwise you is likely to be getting sick.
Understanding how the human physique sometimes reacts to stressors is one approach to construct up your well being consciousness. Garmin smartwatches monitor a wide range of well being and health metrics that may assist a more healthy life-style.
Browse Garmin’s assortment of health and well being monitoring merchandise to start out your well being journey right now.
1See Garmin.com/ataccuracy