BACtrack Mobile Breathalyzer Review – Cheers To Good Times!

TECHNOLOGY X TESTING METHODOLOGY

When we first received the device, we were asked by multiple people how are we going to test this … we thought the answer was quite simple. Drink, test and repeat! We couldn’t just leave it at that though, we needed to add in an additional factor that allowed us to gauge ourselves while drinking and testing the device. For that, we added a reaction time benchmark test to also monitor how our reaction time is influenced by our drinking habits. We utilized the free website, Human Benchmark, which has a fairly simple concept – click the mouse when the red tile turns green. Try it out for yourself!

For our testing we had two subjects, a 23 year old male and 22 year old female. For comparative purposes, both test subjects can be considered to be in good health and near-athletic shape. We wanted to test the BACtrack using two testing methods; practical and incremental. For practicality, we simply went out for dinner with family and friends, enjoyed a few pops and food. When we were done, we tested ourselves and logged our results. For the incremental testing, our night continued by having one beer per hour, and then adding in shots.

PRACTICALITY TESTING

As we said above, the two test subjects went our for a common dinner: pizza, wings and beer. Each subject consumed four beers each that had an alcoholic percentage of 4%, over the time span of approximately an hour and a half. Prior to leaving for dinner, each test subject tested the breathalyzer and reaction time, this was to set the control for our testing. Immediately after the dinner, tests were performed again. The graph below showcases the change in blood alcohol content in both test subjects.

The female’s BAC increased from 0.00 to 0.05 with the four beers, while the male’s BAC went from 0.00 to 0.037. This is to be expected, as female’s have less body water of men with similar weight, thus they would achieve a higher blood alcohol content (1). The graph below shows how the test subjects’ reaction time changed throughout this time.

 After the course of pizza, wings and four beers, it can be seen that our test subjects experienced an increase in their reaction time. Our female test subject experienced an eight percent increase, where our male subject experienced a six percent increase.

INCREMENTAL TESTING

As we spoke about earlier, for the incremental testing the two test subjects simply drank one beer per hour, and introduced a shot at drink number seven. This was to identify how the blood alcohol content would change based upon a standard consumption over a certain period of time. We introduced a shot to our testing to ascertain how much the BAC would alter with a higher percentage alcohol. The graph below indicates how the test subjects’ BAC changed over time.

There are a couple of things that need to be highlight in the above graph. First is the sixth drink, the BAC of our female test subject actually decreased to below that of the males, even though timing and alcohol consumption remained the same. This could possibly be attributed to the fact that women appear to remove alcohol from their blood faster than males. This is attributed to finding that females typically have a higher liver volume per unit of lean body mass (2). Additionally, at drink number 7 there was the introduction of a shot. This shot consisted of an alcoholic percentage of 13.75%. With this introduction, the female’s BAC increased over 35%, while the males increased by 27%. The graph below shows how the test subjects’ reaction time changed over time.

The female test subject experienced her slowest reaction time at drink number four, followed closely by drink number six, with an increase of 8% and 7% accordingly. The male’s reaction time, while experiencing a general slow down, didn’t dramatically change over time. With the slowest reaction time found at drink number six, followed closely by drink number seven. Interestingly enough, our male test subject also saw an increase in reaction time by 8% and 7% accordingly. Another interesting point to be made is at drink number seven, which was the inclusion of a higher percentage alcoholic beverage (the inclusion of one shot), the reaction time didn’t change dramatically.