Health Matters

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What coughs can reveal about your health

By Alice Park

Senior Health Correspondent

Thanks to wearable devices, you're able to track the inner workings of your body with more precision than ever. Now, scientists are even figuring out how to analyze your coughs in real time.

Doctors think getting better information about your personal "cough IQ"—including how many times you cough per day, when you cough, and the type of cough you have—could reveal a lot about your health. Most importantly, that knowledge may help you live better and avoid disease.

Here’s what I learned after talking to some of the largest companies trying to mine cough data:

Smartphone apps and wearable devices can detect coughs from background noise and isolate a person's cough from other coughs with more than 90% accuracy.
Tracking when you cough—after meals, when you’re outside, or at night, for example—can give doctors useful hints about what’s causing your cough.
Cough-tracking apps can help people with allergies and chronic diseases avoid attacks, since their phones or wearables can give them a heads up when their coughing patterns change.

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The job-related benefits of knitting

A recent social-media debate centered on whether it's rude to knit during work meetings—or if it's actually conducive to doing a good job.

In a piece for the New York Times, April Rubin explains that some people don’t knit because they aren’t listening; they knit in order to better listen. The activity, which requires fine-motor movement, activates the same parts of the brain used for focus. It can be a particularly helpful coping method for people with ADHD.

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Today's newsletter was written by Alice Park and Angela Haupt, and edited by Mandy Oaklander.

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