Remote patient monitoring may improve the outcomes of heart failure

Remote patient monitoring software is extremely vital for patient treatment. Researchers reported that nondepressed patients with chronic heart failure (HF) receiving remote patient management added to usual care had fewer “days lost” due to cardiovascular hospital admissions and lower all-cause mortality as compared to patients who got only usual care.

Professor Friedrich Köhler, from the Charité–Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Germany, shared his findings from randomized Telemedical Interventional Management in Heart Failure (TIM-HF2) trial, which included more than 1500 patients at 16 centers in Germany at the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) Congress 2018. The results were simultaneously published online in The Lancet. 

Köhler said that in addition to careful patient selection a “well-structured” telemedicine center that provides 24x7 service is equally important element in the case of remote patient management intervention.

download (39).jpg

This study clearly shows that remote patient management and not just monitoring and watching will be a part of a doctor’s work in the future. He mentioned that doctors will be treating inpatients, outpatients, and remote patients.

Infact, even the oldest patient in the study, aged 92 years, found that collecting and submitting daily data, which included electrocardiogram readings, was easy to be done.

Köhler emphasized that it's not possible to outsource patient management to call centers.