In the near future our glasses might be able to advise us on our diet, warn us we might be in the early stages of Parkinson\u2019s, and let us know if we should seek help for our mental health. Yes, by glasses I mean spectacles. Or rather \u201ceyewear\u201d, for the modern reader. <\/p>\n
Years ago, I laughed when my husband said that soon we would have technology built into clothes, monitoring our physiological processes. I laughed when he said that there would be cars which drove themselves, and if we could figure out how to buy even just 1000 bitcoins we might make lots of money one day (hollow laugh).<\/p>\n
It turns out he was right. Wearable tech is coming on fast, self-driving cars are already on the roads, and that 1000 bitcoin would now be worth about \u00a380 000 000. <\/p>\n Queues around the block at the Brighton Dome<\/em><\/p>\n Last Friday (4th July 2025<\/em>), I found myself at a highly techie conference called Evolve 25 <\/a> at the Brighton Dome. Not being very techie myself, I made a beeline for the medically-based talks, where I lucked out with a fantastic presentation by Charles Nduka<\/a>, Consultant Plastic Surgeon from the esteemed Queen Victoria Hospital in East Grinstead. He specialises in facial reanimation and skin lesions. I had to have some minor facial plastic surgery there myself, but looking at the slides of a 24 year old car crash victim was sobering. (Charles is quite a fan of the self-driving car, by the way. He says that 90% car crashes are due to driver error \u2013 namely, emotional or distracted driving. He believes there will be a dramatic reduction in deaths and injuries when the cars drive themselves.)<\/p>\n Glasses that work like Google maps<\/strong><\/p>\n At this point Charles launched into an interesting analogy. Google Maps, he said, relies on a network, like Waze. It uses data from the GPS on people\u2019s phones to build a real-time map. This donated data forms a kind of collaborative network, creating not only the map but also giving information about what he called the \u201cemotional landscape\u201d of the system: road closures, traffic lights, bottlenecks, jams. It\u2019s a sensitive, responsive system, which, by the use of information received from all users, help to improve the quality of everyone\u2019s life. In other words, it\u2019s a bit like a collective nervous system. Just by going about our day, we\u2019re sending it feedback. That feedback, in turn, helps the system guide us along the smoothest path. 1<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n Can we prevent our body crashing?<\/strong><\/p>\n Charles pointed out that we also have crashes within our body. A brain crash = a stroke. A sugar crash = hypoglycaemia. (Hospitals are crash repair shops, surgeons are mechanics.) However, we don\u2019t have our own dashboard giving us information about fatigue, emotional stress, facial flexibility. We are driving blind. With wearable tech, though, we can track the drift into physical problems, by monitoring aspects of our physiology and getting real time feedback. 70% of premature deaths, he told us, were down to behavioural issues. Maybe if we knew we were heading for disaster earlier, we could take preventative action.<\/p>\n It is true we are not totally driving blind. We know our age, and we do already have heart rate and blood pressure monitors, glucose sensors, thermometers. Following ablation therapy, one of my patients gets a recall when his heart skips a beat, picked up by some kind of sensor. But what additional information can we get from the face? \u2013 the \u201cnaked, hairless, flexible\u201d communicative part of our body. <\/p>\n Optomyography<\/strong><\/p>\n Optomyography, for this is its name \u2013 OMG for short! \u2013 is a a method of tracking tiny facial muscle movements. It receives information up to 6000 times a second from your face, then bluetooths it to your phone. It also measures activation of the sympathetic nervous system. I was a little hazy about how exactly it gets the information, but cameras play a role, and sensing of skin movement. Basically, the glasses will detect emotional states, muscle activity and through this, even very early signs of some conditions (For example, facial stiffening \u2013 the mask like effect of Parkinson\u2019s \u2013 typically begins to occur ten years before you get tremors. ). They will be able to tell if you are smiling or frowning. Charles himself works extensively with facial palsy patients so it is easy to see the use here.<\/p>\n The Ocosense glasses \u2013 developed by Emteq Labs \u2013 also have an outward looking camera. They will be able to film what you eat. Hmm. Is this good? Diet, he stated, is the foundation of all health, and we are currently in a global epidemic of obesity and metabolic disease. No arguing with that. But 90% of type 2 Diabetes cases are curable with diet and exercise, he said.<\/p>\n What Conditions Could be Helped?<\/strong><\/p>\n You might not be able to read the above slide but it is a long list of conditions. I didn\u2019t get them all down but here are the few I did \u2013 <\/p>\n Certainly, the application is broad.<\/p>\n Where is this heading?<\/strong> <\/p>\n The eyeware at the moment looks fairly large and thick rimmed. Think Austin Powers, or Eric Morecambe. However, they are looking to miniaturise the sensors and use them in normal eyewear. One day, he says the phone will only be a secondary device. Your face, and your glasses, will be the primary interface.<\/p>\n I was left with a lot of questions.<\/p>\n What about poker-faced people? Will they be treated as emotionally repressed? Will it capture the full emoji range of emotions\u2014disgust, surprise, doubt, rage, mild contempt\u2014or just smiling and frowning?<\/p>\n And if these glasses can film what you eat, what else might they record? What you drink? Who you see? How much time you spend watching Love Island<\/em>?<\/p>\n If I want to see if I am still grinding my teeth, do I have to wear them to sleep?<\/p>\n We\u2019d like to see a wonderful new world where early signs of illness are caught and treated with meditation, vegetable soup, and long walks in nature. But, big pharma being what it is, it\u2019s just as easy to picture a future in which we\u2019re constantly nudged\u2014perhaps even pressured\u2014toward buying more of their lovely drugs. Today it\u2019s pre-diabetes; tomorrow it could be pre-hypertension, pre-dementia, pre-depression\u2014each with its own pharmacological \u201csolution\u201d.<\/p>\n When does a prevention tool become a surveillance device, and just where is Aldous Huxley when you need him?<\/p>\n Final Thoughts<\/strong> from tech world<\/p>\n I came away from Evolve 25 with a few takeaways:<\/p>\n But wearable tech? Although it\u2019s clearly fraught with danger, the potential upsides seem simply too huge to dismiss, and the momentum seems unstoppable. Right now, the hopes outweigh the fears.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/osteofm.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/20250704_092220.jpg\")
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<\/a><\/figure>\nConcerns and Ethics<\/strong><\/h3>\n
What about people-pleasing over-smilers\u2014those who are crying inside while their zygomaticus major is hard at work? Will the glasses detect genuine feeling or mistake masking for happiness? (Cue Tears of a Clown<\/em>, by Smokey Robinson.)<\/p>\n\n