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Are the SPO2 & HRM sensors accurate?

mandospags
over 3 years ago

Hi, I got a Fr745 a few weeks ago, unfortunately 2 weeks ago I got covid, also unfortunte is that unit is eather dud or the thing is just no use beyond basic sports:

  1. I thought the all day SPO2 reading would be useful and turned it on but foudn the readings ranginf grom 88% to 95%.... didnt seem right as I didnt feel any breathing difficulty. To be sure I got a small (cheap and nasty) pulse oximiter that clips onto you finder.... readings were a steady 98%. Is it normally for the garmin (costing 20x more!) to be this bad? (as a side not my readings dropped few days ago to 94/95% and I could physically feel the difference in my breathing and am now taking steriods, readings back to 98%... the whole time the garmin is just generating random numbers!
  2. Thought this a great time (pershaps only time I will do it) to try soem yoga and pilates since I have been recommneed a 6 week break from running to avoid even a smal charnce of permant cardiac or lung tissue damage. tried many of the workouts but none of them show animations durin the workout, only before... so a useless feature (have a support case open)
  3. I did some light stretching on cardio activity with an alarm set on Max hr --- after a bit my heart rate starts rising above 100 so I stand still... but it keeps going ...120 ,130 ... I start to panic if i am have some covid cytostorm triggerd by excercise ... but then realise that my heart downt feel like it is pounding... eventully the garmin reaches about 180 with me standing completely still.. I clip the little gadget to my finger and my estimate was correct 59 BPM.... Is the watch really this inaccurate? Is it giving the same random numbers when using it for running? Exceptthen my heart really is pounding and maybe dont reallise its so wrong? 

Is my unit a dud or is it normal for the HRM to glitch and the SPO2 to spew out rubbish? Either way is it grounds for either refund or return?

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    I tried various Garmin watches: 245, Venu 2, Vivoactive 4 and found the wrist HR rather not accurate and many times off by a lot. I find it frustrating and am wondering how we all listen to Marketing like blind lemmings.

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    I suggest you to tighten your watch strap and be sure you wear it close to your wrist to get more accurate heartrate readings. Even then any optical heartrate device is not as accurate as heartrate strap. But it shouldnt be so off - more like 5-10 bpm or even less. I find it to be inaccurate only when my heartrate suddenly changes during activity like sprint intervals or sth. SpO2 is only accurate when nothing disturbes your free bloodflow to hand. For example when you sleep hand under your body its normal that readings drop even below 80 or sth. 

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to Kalmer

    The sp02 is pointless I mean who gives a *** what your blood oxygen level is it's not like you can do anything about it. Maybe if training at altitude but even then who monitors that. It's like what's my oxygen today oh 99%, tomorrow oh 98%, next day oh 97% same *** as usual 

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to 9386496

    this is true - it is generally not very useful.. .expect for recently I had covid and it was essential to monitor SPO2. I had to purchase a finger type monitor as the watch was useless. In my case it was critical and I could watch it drop daily, till it reached a trigger point to take medication. Only time I will ever need this feature and it didnt work!

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to mandospags

    Damn. Did you feel out of breath as it dropped? Would you of known to take the medication even without the reader? 

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to 9386496

    Cant say for sure - I did feel it - but it could also have been paronoia due to seeing the readings drop day by day :) Having a fewver for a few days in a row didnt help!