Telemonitoring - Transforming Healthcare, Episode 6

Telemonitoring is the use of information technology to monitor patients at a distance, involving recording vital signs like blood pressure and pulse and transmitting this information electronically.

Telemonitoring allows the patient's medical team to track and monitor their patient's vitals on a regular basis, use this data to identify signs of deterioration, intervene promptly, and prevent admission to hospital.

Before the pandemic, data suggested that routinely monitoring hospitalized patients with continuous pulse oximetry and heart rate devices was associated with reduced mortality.

In a study involving more than 100,000 patient discharges, early recognition of hypoxemia and respiratory depression were largely responsible for the observed decrease in mortality from continuous monitoring.

Home telemonitoring has emerged as a potential solution to reduce healthcare costs.

According to a meta-analysis, healthcare costs from telemonitoring showed ambiguous results, with three studies reporting an increase in healthcare costs, three studies reporting a reduction, and four studies reporting no significant differences.

Healthcare cost reductions from telemonitoring were realized through a reduction in hospitalizations.

Healthcare cost increases from telemonitoring were caused by the high cost of the telemonitoring program or increased healthcare utilization.

Telemonitoring of hypertension in pregnancy is likely to become commonplace in the next five to 10 years.

Research must be directed to ensure that telemonitoring for hypertension in pregnancy is used most safely before its general introduction into daily clinical practice.

Raising women's awareness of their health condition through telemonitoring could improve both pregnancy and long-term health outcomes.