How Your Smartwatch Could Save Your Pregnancy

A new study from Scripps Research suggests that wearable devices for pregnancy monitoring, including consumer gadgets like the Apple Watch, Fitbit, and Garmin, could offer a groundbreaking way to track maternal health. By measuring signals such as heart rate, sleep, and activity, these devices may detect changes linked to pregnancy hormones, offering valuable insights into both healthy and high-risk pregnancies.

The research, published in eBioMedicine, comes at a critical time. In the United States, more than two million women of childbearing age live in “maternal care deserts,” areas with little or no access to obstetric services. Wearable devices could provide a lifeline by bringing continuous monitoring directly into people’s homes.

How heart rate and hormones connect

To explore this idea, the researchers used PowerMom, a bilingual digital research platform that allows volunteers to share data from their personal wearables. Out of more than 5,600 participants, 108 women consented to provide device data spanning three months before pregnancy through six months after giving birth.

When the team analysed the data, they discovered striking patterns:

Early pregnancy: Heart rates dipped slightly between weeks five and nine.
Mid to late pregnancy: Rates then climbed steadily, peaking about 9.4 beats per minute higher than pre-pregnancy levels.
Postpartum: After delivery, heart rates dropped below baseline before stabilising around six months.

These shifts closely mirrored the natural rise and fall of hormones such as estrogen, progesterone, and human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG), which are essential for a healthy pregnancy.

Possible link to pregnancy complications

Beyond healthy pregnancies, the study offered early signs that wearable data could also flag complications. In a small number of cases, women who experienced miscarriages or stillbirths showed different heart rate trends compared to those with full-term live births. While more research is needed, this finding suggests that wearable devices could one day help predict risks like gestational diabetes or preeclampsia earlier than traditional methods.

Why this matters for maternal health

According to co-senior author Dr. Giorgio Quer, director of artificial intelligence at Scripps Research, this digital approach “offers a unique opportunity to address the high number of adverse pregnancy outcomes in the U.S.” By capturing real-time data outside of clinic visits, wearable technology could help fill critical gaps in care, especially for women in underserved areas.
Dr. Tolúwalàṣẹ Àjàyí, principal investigator of PowerMom, adds that understanding the connection between hormones and heart rate could open the door to new ways of supporting women throughout pregnancy and postpartum recovery.

What comes next

The research team plans to expand their study to include a wider range of participants across different ages, ethnicities, and geographic regions. Their long-term goal is to develop predictive models that can identify individuals who might need extra monitoring or medical support during pregnancy.
Future studies will also combine wearable data with blood samples to more directly confirm how closely physiological patterns align with hormone levels. If successful, this could establish wearable devices for pregnancy monitoring as a trusted tool in clinical decision-making.

Conclusion

While still in the early stages, this study highlights how everyday fitness trackers could be repurposed as powerful health tools. By offering continuous, noninvasive monitoring, wearable devices for pregnancy monitoring may help detect early warning signs, personalise prenatal care, and ultimately improve outcomes for mothers and babies, particularly in communities with limited access to obstetric services.

Source: Inputs from various media Sources

Conclusion

Priya Bairagi

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I’m a pharmacist with a strong background in health sciences. I hold a BSc from Delhi University and a pharmacy degree from PDM University. I write articles and daily health news while interviewing doctors to bring you the latest insights. In my free time, you’ll find me at the gym or lost in a sci-fi novel.