Dr. Jay Wiles

The funniest thing about this, Chris, is that let's say circa 10, 15 years ago, like we would have never been having this discussion.

And so for someone like me, who is early to the game in the field of heart rate variability, because I was exposed to it, let's say 15 years ago when I first started doing mostly clinical work.

Now, everybody has access to this.

Because of the advent of wearable technology, we all have accessibility to something that you used to have to go into, let's say, a specialized academic clinic in order to receive.

I worked at the Department of Veteran Affairs as a resident.

Within that context, I was exposed to it because we utilized three-lead, six-lead, 12-lead

And so these are $30,000, $50,000, $60,000 worth of equipment.

And so within that context, it's great to see now that we can all obtain this data.

But the problem is that nobody actually understands what the hell this thing is.

Yeah, indeed.

So the way I like to explain heart rate variability is first by giving a broad definition of what HRV actually is.

And then I like to backpedal a little bit because I think that the definition that I'm going to give is probably a little bit too broad.

And heart rate variability in and of itself is actually quite nuanced.

So when we think about HRV or heart rate variability, and I'm going to say HRV probably for the rest of the podcast because heart rate variability is a mouthful.

HRV is the single greatest non-invasive proxy that we have for measuring the adaptations of the nervous system.

HRV is a signal.

It's a window into how the nervous system is responding at any given time or the time we're actually measuring it.

And so when we think about HRV, I want people to think about adaptation, to think about resilience, and to think about flexibility.

Those are probably three words that I'll use quite often within this context.

So if it's looking at the adaptations of the nervous system, I like to backpedal a little bit and I explain what we mean by nervous system.