New digital solution helps curb COVID-19 risk in the Philippines

MANILA, Philippines — Nauts and Vectors Company Inc., NAVCO, the official distributor of Garmin smart wearables in the Philippines, announces a partnership with WellteQ, a Singapore-headquartered digital wellbeing platform that enables access to the latest innovative healthcare.

Employee support

Garmin Philippines’ mission is to help Filipinos enhance their overall health and wellbeing in an attempt to build resistance against the current virus outbreak. The data a Garmin device collects and the mapping features it provides are invaluable in monitoring general health and wellbeing as well as being able to track changes in mental and physical wellbeing that might not be easily perceptible to a non-medical professional.

With Garmin’s new integrated FirstBeat technology, it’s been discovered that an increase of eight beats per minute (BPM) in resting heart rate equates to an increase of one degree centigrade in temperature. This data is monitored through the WellteQ digital ecosystem for a cost-effective, accessible and efficient COVID-19 defense that could help minimize the spread of the virus.

By integrating Garmin’s smart wearables and fitness trackers capabilities and features into WellteQ’s digital wellness platform, WellteQ extends the use case of digital wellbeing into the continuity of care. Its suite of digital health assessment and wellbeing tools now extend past objective health risk assessment and preventative coaching into measurable action in a user’s health and wellbeing profile.

Aiding resistance to illness

While a user works towards their health and fitness goals, measurable evidence of their progress is tracked in the WellteQ platform for consistency, aiding sustained behavioral change. Starting with smaller goals and with the aid of intelli-nudges, a personalized in-app notification to help keep the user on track, momentum is built-up until the user feels more confident to tackle larger health objectives.

Strong general wellness has been proven as the greatest resistance against developing non-communicable diseases, improving mental health issues and reducing the risk of contracting viruses. With the precision accuracy of Garmin’s health data, metrics such a sleep cycles, blood oxygen saturation (SpO2), and stress levels, measured through heart rate variability (HRV), small changes in physiological responses are tracked and benchmarked against the user’s own history, as well as WellteQ’s global population database.

A new business solution

For employers, this collaboration offers an end-to-end solution for their workforce that spans prevention programs and wellness resistance improvement, to disease management and home-based health monitoring. The combined solution provides employees with the right tools to stay active, strengthen their immune system, and maintain their fitness level during periods of lockdown in the ongoing health crisis:

• More accurate employee profiling allowing employees to get ahead of the risk before the situation becomes more serious and costly.
• Safe and secure digital environment for employees ensures user anonymity as only aggregated information is reported back to the employer.
• A dedicated solution that improves the lives of the workforce irrespective of location.

 “By using advanced, functionally-integrated technology, we create landmark products that set new standards for user-centric health and wellbeing experiences. This will not only help employees but increase the return of investment for businesses. We make a really simple and transparent process for companies to see their return on investing in wellbeing. I am very excited to see how we can transform workplace health together,” said Neil Anthony Tan, managing director of NAVCO.

“We’re thrilled to be deepening our relationship with Garmin as we now expand into the Philippines, a region that’s been on our radar for quite some time. We feel we have a huge advantage of having NAVCO as our on-the-ground partner in offering a new standard in health and wellbeing technology. By combining our client relationships and years of experience, we’re positive that we’ve developed a solution for the market, by the market,” said Scott Montgomery, chief executive officer of WellteQ.

Understanding the importance of family in the Philippines, we’ve extended our solution to include spouses, a unique offering that we envision will not only encourage employees engagement but will aid in the creation of health support networks outside of the workplace. We can’t wait to get started,” he concluded.

Understanding the increased time spent at home during various stages of lockdown, the enterprise solution is extended to both employees and their spouses in the Philippines region to create a supportive environment that can be enjoyed in the family home.