Give 1000 people apple watches with the app versus 1000 people other smart watches without the capability. At the end of the year, find out how well diagnosed the two groups are.
Yep—this is a good sketch of a randomized control trial to measure the primary outcome, change in diagnosis rate.
Secondary outcomes you might look at are overall change in medical spend, e.g., is this intervention cost-saving, or at least cost-effective? And change in treatment, which may be independent of diagnosis rate.
The tweak I'd make is that you don't need to give out Apple Watches, Garmins, Fitbits, or Android Wear watches. People are buying these devices on their own already. Given ubiquity of hardware, continuous screening may be achievable at close to zero marginal cost.
Aetna, the US health insurance company, is planning to give away or offer a reduced price for Apple Watches to its 23 M customers. Apparently, following prescriptions is one of several planned apps to help increase health and reduce costs.
https://www.engadget.com/2017/08/15/aetna-in-talks-for-disco...
“Versus Apple watches without the app” is the better control, I would think. It would make it easier to keep their GP’s in the dark as to who is in the control group and who isn’t.
