Tuesday Jan 28, 2025

157. Using Wearable Data to Make Global Health Changes | Chris Peng

“Healthiness is resilience,” says Chris Peng, the CEO and co-founder of Labfront, drawing on a definition from his dad’s lab that challenges traditional views of health and reframes it through adaptability.

In this episode, Chris and Dr. Andrew Fix talk about how continuous data from wearable devices like Garmin and Dexcom is reshaping healthcare, and offer insights into individual health patterns. Why rely on single data points when the human body is constantly changing? Chris shares how Labfront is helping researchers and institutions like Harvard and MIT use continuous data to tackle inefficiencies and improve outcomes.

With a focus on resilience as the ultimate measure of health, Chris points out how wearable technology empowers individuals to understand their unique responses to stress, sleep, and even alcohol consumption.

Health isn’t about perfection, but about how well we adapt. Tune in to Chris and Dr. Fix’s discussion that offers a fresh, human-centered take on the future of healthcare.

Quotes

“The current medical system and the way that we practice medicine, built around the constraints that existed in the past… You go into the doctor’s office, you take one blood pressure monitor, you maybe do a blood test, you do a couple things. But essentially, it’s one data point. And as much as that data point is helpful to bring some context, there is a much more multi-layered depth of context that can exist. However, the current medical system is no fault of their own, but basically the research side has not caught up to start doing and understanding this type of data.” (06:31 | Chris Peng)
“Unfortunately, the system, just like everything else, is not a one-size-fits-all. And as I mentioned before, the science and the research is still very, very, very new.” (12:12 | Chris Peng)
“If you’re trying to define what is a ‘healthy state,’ it’s really hard to kind of say what health is. We have infinite definitions of disease states. But lack of disease is not healthy per se. And that’s something that I think is really important.” (18:12 | Chris Peng)
“Healthiness is resilience... The better your ability to adapt to situations, the more healthy you are.” (18:48 | Chris Peng)
“Science learns from the process and figures things out. And yes, it can be originally influenced by a lot of corporations and their funding, but over the long term, the truth does win out.” (30:17 | Chris Peng)

Links

Connect with Chris Peng:

https://www.labfront.com/

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