Target blood pressure reached by 66% of patients using Sky Labs' blood pressure ring after six months

[Financial News] The rate of patients reaching their target blood pressure was higher among those whose hypertension medication was adjusted using Sky Labs' ring-shaped blood pressure monitor than among patients receiving usual care. The findings suggest that 24-hour blood pressure data, including changes during daily activities and sleep, may help guide medication adjustments during hypertension treatment.
Sky Labs announced on the 16th that the results of a clinical study of CART, its ring-shaped cuffless blood pressure monitor, conducted by a cardiology research team at Korea University Anam Hospital, had been published in Clinical Hypertension, the official journal of the Korean Society of Hypertension.
The study followed 246 patients with hypertension whose blood pressure was not adequately controlled for six months. The research team compared outcomes for 67 patients whose medication adjustments were guided by 24-hour blood pressure data measured with CART with those of 179 patients who received usual care.
An analysis of 162 patients who completed 24-hour blood pressure monitoring after six months found that the target blood pressure attainment rate was 65.8% in the CART group, 29.5 percentage points higher than the 36.3% in the usual-care group. This figure came from an additional exploratory analysis. The adjusted 24-hour mean systolic blood pressure, accounting for patient characteristics and other factors, was also 7.35 mmHg lower in the CART group than in the usual-care group.
Differences were also seen in medication adjustments. Over six months, the average increase in the number of classes of hypertension medication prescribed was greater in the CART group, at 0.85, than in the usual-care group, at 0.37. This suggests that 24-hour blood pressure data could serve as a reference for clinicians when adjusting medication and deciding on treatment.
Conventional hypertension care is based primarily on blood pressure measured in the clinic. However, clinic readings alone make it difficult to fully track blood pressure changes during daily activities or sleep. CART is a ring-shaped medical device worn on the finger that measures blood pressure over 24 hours without an arm-compressing cuff, allowing changes during the day and night to be tracked.
However, this was a prospective study in which patients were not randomly assigned, so the observed differences alone are not enough to establish CART's effectiveness in controlling blood pressure. The research team said further validation through randomized clinical trials is needed.
Sky Labs CEO Lee Byung-hwan said, "This study showed that the CART blood pressure monitor can be used not only to measure blood pressure but also to support clinicians in adjusting hypertension medication and making treatment decisions." He added, "We will continue to build clinical evidence and advance AI-based medical data technology to contribute to chronic disease management."

[email protected] Jeong Sang-hee Reporter