Measuring Stress & Activity with the Vital Scout Wellness Monitor

This Vital Scout review is sponsored by VivaLNK , INC. All opinions my own.

I’ve tried lots of different wellness monitors over the years. Monitors you wear on your wrist, monitors that measure your sleep, monitors that measure your steps—anything you can think of. The reason I’ve tried so many is that I like the data they give me. I’m always keen to learn what affects my body and in which ways. Do I tend to have better days when I get more sleep? (Yes!) What about when I get regular exercise? (Also yes!)

But one type of monitor I hadn’t yet tried was one that attaches to your chest with adhesive. That’s exactly what the Vital Scout Wellness Monitor (which I’m reviewing for you in this post) does! It uses medical-grade ECG sensors and proven HRV algorithms to track stress, recovery, sleep, and activity levels.

At first glance, the Vital Scout Wellness Monitor seems a little intimidating. You wear it all the time? It’s measuring your heart and respiration rates constantly? But once I “got to know it” a little better, my hesitations turned into excitement.

I was excited to use it to see how far I push my body in the gym, what my stress levels are like when I’m working, and how my various lifestyle choices affect my vitals.

The first thing I had to do was charge the Vital Scout in its space-age pod with the included micro-USB cable. While it was charging, I downloaded the free Vital Scout app from the App Store.  Once it was charged, I followed the simple instructions to pair the Vital Scout with my app via bluetooth.

Next, the instructions told me how to attach the patch to my skin, right above my heart. To prepare the area, I washed it with soap and dried it thoroughly. If you have a hairy chest, you’ll want to shave the area.

The makers of Vital Scout recommend wearing it for at least 48 hours before starting to draw too many conclusions from your data. So that’s exactly what I did.

I put my Vital Scout on one morning—just a regular day of work. I wore it to the gym that day. I wore it in the shower. I wore it to sleep that night. I wore it for a few days and collected lots of data before the adhesive started to bug my sensitive skin.

Here’s what I discovered:

• My weightlifting workouts often affected my body the same as “stress” (red bars). That makes sense—when I lift, I go through bursts of heavy exertion.
• Cardio workouts were captured as “activity” (green bars). Good!
• I am a DEEP sleeper! I hardly ever stir in the night.
• Driving in the city registers as stress for me. I live in a tourist-y area so…that sounds about right.
• While wearing the patch, I was more aware of the things that triggered an increased heart and respiration rate. This made it easier for me to focus, take a few deep breaths, and calm down when I needed to.

I really enjoyed trying the Vital Scout. It reminded me to take a front seat when it comes to my heart and respiration rates, and to employ strategies like deep breathing and meditation when things started to get a little hairy. I try to be good about these things on an everyday basis, but hey—we all get caught up in the hubbub sometimes, right?

Thank you VivaLNK for giving me the opportunity to try out the Vital Scout Wellness Monitor! To purchase one of your own, visit the Vital Scout website.