Quantifying Myself: A Month of Self-tracking

Last night, I went to sleep with an electrical sensor wrapped around my forehead, an accelerometer strapped on one wrist, and a sweat sensor around the other. I woke up 11 times (according to the accelerometer), slept for 7 hours and 23 minutes (according to the electrical sensor), and had a strange fit of anxiety or high temperature around 4:45 a.m. (according to the sweat sensor).

My highly quantified sleep is a part of a personal experiment in self-tracking, a nascent movement that I have been exploring over the last month in which users monitor various personal metrics in order to make better decisions about their health and behavior.

For my own journey in self-tracking, I tested the Fitbit, a thumb-size device that measures activity; the Zeo sleep monitor; a Wi-Fi scale from Withings; the Q-sensor from Affectiva; a blood pressure tracker from MedHelp; and an online mood-tracking app from Moodscope. I tracked my runs and hikes with the RunKeeper app, which also aggregated the data from the Fitbit, the Zeo, and the Withings scale. My specific discoveries are probably of interest mainly to me, but that's part of the philosophy of the self-tracking movement: to use these tools to take control of your own health.

On the spectrum of self-tracking, I definitely fall on the lazy end. Case in point: I weigh myself almost every day and have been meaning to write down the numbers for years. But I haven't. Not once. Then I heard about the Withings scale, which automatically sends your weight to a smart phone or online graph. I do absolutely nothing more than I usually do, but now I get a detailed record of my weight, muscle mass, and BMI (body mass index). Perhaps counterintuitively, the fact that my numbers will be recorded gives me more motivation to step on the scale on days I suspect it will give me bad news. The Withings scale can also be set up to tweet your weight, a feature I did not use. (The prospect sends a chill of fear down my spine.)

Tomorrow: The perils of too much sitting .

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Wrist blood pressure monitor. Intelligence with Sigma Cuff technology for more accurate, more comfortable readings, compact for use anywhere, extra large digital display, pulse, date & time, 60 memory storage w/date & time stamp, advanced averaging, durable pre-formed cuff fits wrists 5-1/4"-8-1/2" in circumference. Illustarted manual, carrying case and 2 "AAA" bateries included. Our mission is to provide quality healthcare equipment to our customers. Your satisfaction is our number one priority. We provide a 24 hour  customer service to our clients.  Insurance and Medicare/Medicaid covered -  QT Medical Supplies Corporation is a Medicare and Medicaid approved facility. We can help people with HMO/PPO as their primary coverage.

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