Withings adds new diary feature to its sleep mat

Image: Withings

While Withings isn't a stranger to wrist-based sleep tracking, the company announced today that it is adding a new diary feature to its most novel sleep monitoring gadget.

The mat, which is placed under a person's mattress, gathers sleep data like heart rate, sleep stages, and snoring. Users can combine their own observations with the data collected from the mat with the new Sleep Diary feature. A new dashboard gathers sleep data over time. A PDF report can be shared with doctors.

According to the press release, the diary feature was developed with the input of sleep physicians and is based on medical questionnaires. Doctors and sleep clinics use the Epworth Sleepiness Scale to evaluate a person's daytime sleepiness. The STOP-Bang Questionnaire is used to screen for sleep disorders. Neither can a person be diagnosed with a specific sleeping disorder, and both are used to determine if a patient should receive further testing.

Image: Withings

Manual sleep diaries are used in sleep research but are subjective. It combines personal observations with data collected from the mat. It depends on how accurate the Withings Sleep's metrics are. I tested an older version of the mat back in the day. My experience was that the mat was very accurate. The jury is out on how accurate sleep trackers are. Ian Twinn of Withings said in an email that the hardware is the same, but there have been several updates since the sale of the digital health business to Withings.

Wearable makers are working on ways to detect and diagnose sleep disorders. The FDA cleared Withings to use its SpO2 sensor in its ScanWatch to detect nighttime breathing problems. The new Sleep Diary feature isn't quite on that scale, but it does seem to be a more useful method for people hoping to track long-term sleep patterns over time. Most sleep trackers aren't the best at giving users a bird's eye view of their sleeping patterns beyond a week or two.