While the platform could be better than nothing, a 90 percent accuracy rate still leaves room for asymptomatic individuals to slip through the cracks. If 1,000 people use the system, 100 people may still get inaccurate results. So while this shows promise and it could indicate the kinds of solutions we’ll have in the future, it may take some time before something like this is ready for real-world use.

“We feel this platform will be integral to protecting our healthcare workers, first responders and communities as we adjust to life in the COVID-19 era,” said Ali Rezai, RNI executive chair.

The platform is currently being tested by more than 600 healthcare professionals and first responders, and RNI is working with partners like Thomas Jefferson University and Vanderbilt University to scale the test to include more than 10,000 participants. 

The study isn’t the only attempt to use the rings to predict COVID-19 infections. Researchers from the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) are also exploring how Oura Ring might be used to detect the virus in emergency medical workers.

“We are hopeful that Oura’s technology will advance how people identify and understand our body’s most nuanced physiological signals and warning signs, as they relate to infectious diseases like COVID-19,” Oura Health CEO Harpreet Rai said in a statement.

Matthew Goodwin, a Northeastern University behavioral scientist, created the wearable. While the initial tests show promise, Goodwin and his team of researchers only observed 20 children with autism over a period of 87 hours. They tracked each aggressive episode and corresponding physiological changes and then fed that data into their model. Next, Goodwin hopes to test the device with 240 individuals — thanks in part to funding from the Department of Defense.

“As our data set grows and we use more sophisticated machine learning models, I think we might get more than 60 seconds,” Goodwin said. While the technology is still deep in development, it could make a difference in the lives of people with autism, as well as their families and caretakers. It would join other tech like Google Glass, AI and educational apps that have all been used to help individuals with autism.