A New, Smarter Wearable That Fights Joint Pain

…and other items from this week’s health news:

The Wearable “Goldilocks” Heater

If you’ve ever used a heating pad to combat joint pain, chances are you ran into two problems:

1. Getting it to be and remain where it needs to be
2. Getting it to a therapeutic temperature without the heat then building up to the point that it needs to be switched off after a short while

Scientists (and engineers) have now tackled this:

❝Our goal was to make thermal therapy truly wearable—not just portable, but adaptive and intuitive. By integrating precise sensors and closed-loop control into a stretchable format, we’re giving patients the ability to receive therapy in real time, tailored to their specific environment and condition.

This technology reflects the future of personalized medicine, where treatment moves with the body and responds as needed. It’s not just engineering—it’s empathy through innovation.❞

This flexibility and adaptiveness was found to be durable throughout testing (including more than 1,000 use cycles), and even remained accurate during exercise:

Read in full: Flexible smart heater delivers real-time thermal therapy for joint pain

Related: 10 Tips To Reduce Morning Pain & Stiffness With Arthritis

How Likely is not recovering from covid now?

After the initial lockdowns in what is now the increasingly dim and distant past, numbers were crunched, and it was decided that it was best to lift anti-COVID measures, and that hopefully the deaths would be mostly confined to minorities such as the very young, the old, the chronically ill, the disabled, and so forth.

Which may have a bit of a Lord Farquaad “Some of you may die, but it’s a sacrifice I am willing to make” feel to it (if you know the meme), but it’s certainly become “the new normal”. Of course, the reports on incidence rates (and thus, mortality rates) have gone down a lot since testing was discontinued, so it’s difficult to know certain parts of the statistical background to COVID in the US in 2025.

What we can know, however, is that of those that are recorded, and who survive initial infection (which, one bit of good news, does at least seem to be most people nowadays), there is approximately a 20% chance of not recovering fully within a year. That doesn’t mean “it’ll take a year to recover”, by the way, that means “it was 12-month study” so what happens to those people in the future after those 12 months is not yet known.

However, it seems fair to say that even at the very best if it’s been a year and you haven’t recovered, it’s not exactly “just a cold”.

Read in full: One in five never fully recover quality of life after COVID-like illness

Related: Why Some People Get Sick More (And How To Not Be One Of Them)

It’s time for diabetes prevention

Intermittent fasting is a common tool used with the intention of improving metabolic health, and there has been much discussion about how much it matters what time of day (in the context of the rest of our circadian rhythm) we eat.

To this end, researchers investigated how the timing of lifestyle habits (eating, sleeping, moving) affects metabolic health and risk for type 2 diabetes, using wearable tech and real-time tracking. They found:

About meal timing:

• Eating more between 14:00–17:00 was linked to lower fasting glucose.
• Eating more between 17:00–21:00 was linked to higher glucose, more time in hyperglycemia, and worse next-day glucose levels.

About the meals:

• Carbs from non-starchy vegetables were linked to better glucose control.
• Carbs from starchy vegetables were linked to higher fasting glucose and HbA1c.

About sleep:

• Greater variability in sleep efficiency led to higher night and next-day glucose.
• Irregular wake times were linked to worse glucose tolerance and lower incretin effects.

About links between diet and sleep:

• More legumes, fruit, potassium, and fiber = better and longer sleep.
• Early energy intake (especially 8:00–11:00) correlated with longer sleep duration.

About physical activity:

• More steps between 8:00–11:00 improved glucose control in insulin-resistant individuals.
• More steps between 14:00–17:00 improved glucose control in insulin-sensitive individuals.
• More steps after dinner but before midnight reduced nocturnal hyperglycemia.
• Nocturnal activity (00:00–5:00) worsened glucose regulation for all.

Also, longer sedentary periods at any time were linked to greater hyperglycemia.

Read in full: Meal and sleep timing play key roles in diabetes prevention

Related: The Circadian Rhythm: Far More Than Most People Know ← our expert insights feature on Dr. Satchin Panda, author of The Circadian Diabetes Code

Take care!