Texas Man Credits Apple Watch With Saving His Life by Alerting Him to Heart Health Scare
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February is Heart Month, making it an excellent time to share another report of a life saved by the Apple Watch irregular heart notification and atrial fibrillation (Afib) detection features.
Mike Gomez, a resident of Austin, Texas, recently shared how his Apple Watch helped save his life after the device alerted him to possible heart issues via a series of irregular heart rate notifications and an Afib detection alert.
Gomez took immediate action after receiving the Apple Watch alerts, seeking medical assistance at a nearby hospital. Doctors there treated him for the heart issue, allowing Gomez to avoid a possible stroke or other health problems.
Fox 7 Austin reports:
For Gomez, his Apple Watch was just another tool to track his workouts and monitor his calories.
However, on Jan. 24, Gomez got an alert he had never seen before: an elevated heart rate warning, followed by more notifications.
“The fifth notification that said we have detected, you know, atrial fibrillation. Contact your emergency. Contact your health professional immediately. And I was like, wow that’s pretty strange,” said Gomez.
Even though Gomez said he felt fine, he decided to pay attention to his watch’s warnings and went to the hospital.
“They said, yeah, well, let’s go ahead and hook you up, and check you out and, you know, see what’s going on. And sure enough, they confirmed it within a minute of hooking up like, yeah, you’re in serious Afib right now,” said Gomez.
Atrial fibrillation, or Afib, is a quivering or irregular heartbeat, or arrhythmia, says the American Heart Association (AHA). The condition can lead to blood clots, stroke, heart failure, and other heart-related complications. Over five million Americans have Afib, according to the AHA.
Patients that have experienced Afib say their heart “flip-flops, skips beats, and feels like it’s banging against my chest wall,” especially when exerting themselves. Other symptoms can include nausea, and feeling light-headed and weak (I have Afib, and the nausea and weakness were my main symptoms. Unfortunately, at the time of my Afib, I still had an Apple Watch Series 1, which did not offer Afib detection)
The Apple Watch has the ability to monitor the wearer’s heart rate while they’re wearing it. Users can enable notifications from the Heart Rate app on the Apple Watch to provide alerts when it detects high or low heart rates and irregular heart rhythms.
The Apple Watch Series 4 and later, as well as all Apple Watch Ultra models, offer an ECG app that can perform simple electrocardiograms. Apple Watch SE models also support irregular heart rate notifications, including Afib, but cannot perform an ECG.
The American Heart Association says in its 2025 report that on average, someone in the United States dies of cardiovascular disease (CVD) every 34 seconds. That adds up to 2,580 US deaths each day. In 2022, CVD was the underlying cause of death for 941,652 people in the US.
While the Apple Watch can detect and warn wearers of possible heart issues, Cardiologist Dr. Vivek Goswami, with Heart Hospital of Austin and Austin Heart, told FOX 7 that people need to start taking better care of themselves.
“We really should be viewing things like exercise as a prescription, not just a recommendation. So right now, a lot of people feel that exercise is kind of the selective thing that they can get to. If it’s convenient, it’s a good thing to do. We really should be viewing a day without exercise, similar to a day of not taking our medicines. And that goes for what we’re eating as well. Our kitchens are killing us and when we have a meal choice, we should always be calculated about what we’re putting our body and make healthy food choices,” said Dr. Goswami.
