When a patient comes in with sleep times recorded on a Fitbit, doctors can now assume the device provides useful data, researchers say.

One model of the Fitbit activity tracker is as accurate in monitoring sleep patterns as the more expensive research-grade actigraphs, write the Monash University study authors.

“Clinically, patients often show up at sleep disorders clinics with output from such devices, hoping their doctor can make sense of it,” said lead researcher Professor Sean Drummond, of the Turner Institute for Brain and Mental Health, Melbourne.

Even though this was becoming more common, doctors were still wary of integrating the data into treatment due to a lack of validation, the authors wrote in the Journal of Sleep Research.