Wearable Ambulatory Monitoring Devices Market

Wearable ambulatory monitoring devices are used to monitor the patient’s heart rates and provide the patient data to healthcare professionals through the wireless network. The growing prevalence rate of cardiac diseases, increasing demand for ambulatory monitoring devices, coupled with quick and enhanced diagnostics of cardiovascular diseases, is expected to enhance the growth of the market. However, the increasing number of product recalls and complications related to devices are projected to curb the growth of the market.

Coronary heart diseases, strokes, transient ischemic attack (TIA), peripheral arterial disease, and aortic diseases are some of the common types of cardiovascular diseases (CVD). Smoking, high cholesterol level, high blood pressure, tobacco, physical inactivity, unhealthy diet, alcohol, overweight, and obesity are some of the common causes of CVDs. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in 2017, over 18.2 million adults in the US aged 20 and above had coronary heart disease. The data also states that in 2017, about 805,000 Americans had a heart attack. As per the statistics published by the American College of Cardiology Foundation in 2019, coronary heart disease events are expected to occur in about 1 million individuals in the US, including 335,000 recurrent and 720,000 new coronary events.

A similar rise in the number of heart diseases has been observed in other parts of the world. For instance, according to the British Heart Foundation, about 1.4 million people in the UK have been diagnosed with Atrial Fibrillation as of December 2019, and about 1 in every six patients is not treated effectively. This creates demand for monitoring the disease and thereby is expected to boost the demand for wearable ambulatory monitoring devices.

As the prevalence of chronic cardiovascular conditions keeps on rising, the continuous monitoring of patients with heart diseases is extremely crucial. Here-in, cardiac monitoring devices play an integral part in monitoring patients and avoiding the risk of heart failure and other associated risks. Annually, over 795,000 Americans have a new or recurrent stroke. Among these patients, 90% are observed to have a stroke due to modifiable risk factors and 74% due to behavioral risk factors. These risk factors can be detected earlier by wearable ambulatory monitoring devices by tracking the physiologic changes to notice early detection of CVDs. Thus, the growing prevalence of cardiac diseases is expected to increase the demand and use of ambulatory monitoring devices which thereby provides a favorable scenario for the market to grow over the forecast period.

The increasing innovation in the wearable ambulatory monitoring devices market is expected to largely affect the growth of the market during the assessment period. For instance, in November 2017, BioTelemetry, the US manufacturer of medical devices, came in partnership with Apple Inc. to provide cardiac monitoring services in combination with Apple Heart Study. This partnership is an initiative to benefit the individuals who are unaware that they might be at risk of serious health problems. In May 2018, GE Healthcare announced the collaboration with Preventice Solutions to provide an integrated solution to in-house ECG, long-term Holter, cardiac event monitoring (CEM), and mobile cardiac telemetry (MCT), which will result in a single portal utilizing the GE Healthcare MUSE cardiac management system. Thus, the growing worldwide demand for precise monitoring devices influences key players to create more and more innovation in the near future. As a result, this will lead to the growth of the wearable ambulatory monitoring devices market.

Furthermore, smart algorithms and Artificial Intelligence (AI) are entering into the market to support the diagnosis further. AI will operate in the background of the monitoring software, continuously reviewing real-time patient data, and quickly studying days or weeks of recorded data in seconds. This will likely be a big help in triggering CVD events. Thus, the advancements in technology such as support of AI in cardiology to speed up the therapy and potentially cut the time needed to monitor the patients is expected to create an opportunity for market growth during the forecast period.

The increase in product recalls in recent years has impacted the growth of wearable ambulatory monitoring devices negatively. For instance, in February 2016, Medtronic PLC announced the recall of its Reveal LINQ Insertable Cardiac Monitor (ICM) in Australia. This recall was classified under Class II as it might cause temporary or medically reversible adverse health consequences in patients. Such incidences affect the sales of other brands of companies, which results in decreased growth for the company, as well as a decrease in the growth for the whole market.