CareVention HealthCare, a division of Tabula Rasa HealthCare, launched a remote patient monitoring service that uses biosensors and artificial intelligence to monitor patients’ vital signs and alert health care providers if necessary.
Patients will receive a monitoring device and biosensors, like thermometers, oximeters and blood pressure machines, when they sign up for the service. CareVention partnered with health care tech company Thaïs for its platform and monitoring devices, which send data to Thaïs’ monitoring center.
“Remote monitoring enables a provider to intervene quickly when necessary and focus resources on the patients who need care the most,” Calvin H. Knowlton, CEO of Tabula Rasa, said in a statement. “This can improve patient health and safety and decrease unnecessary, costly utilization, such as ER visits and hospital admissions.”
WHY IT MATTERS
Remote patient monitoring can be beneficial for managing chronic conditions, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic as patients avoided care settings for fear of infection.
“RPM is useful for continuous observation of patients with COVID-19 or flu, or patients with symptoms of COVID or flu who need to quarantine, have been discharged from the hospital or emergency room, or have been seen by their provider for these symptoms,” Dr. Ankur Patel, chief medical director of Tabula Rasa, said in a statement. “RPM is also an important tool in caring for patients with chronic conditions, such as COPD, diabetes, hypertension and congestive heart failure.”
In a review of patient monitoring studies on a variety of health conditions published in BMJ Open, nearly half of studies found remote patient monitoring helped avoid emergency readmissions and shortened length of hospital stays.
iPhones and Apple Watches can also help monitor patients with cardiovascular disease using sensor data and an app-guided version of the six-minute walk test, according to a study by Stanford University researchers funded by Apple.
The clinical trial space is also ripe for remote patient monitoring; a survey by VivaLNK found 44% had adopted remote monitoring for trials or have plans to in the next year, largely driven by pandemic restrictions.
THE LARGER TREND
Several digital health companies have expanded the use of remote patient monitoring devices in just the past few months.
Last month, health care tech developer LifeSigns received FDA clearance for a single-use wearable biosensor that could track electrocardiography, heart rate, respiration rate, skin temperature and body posture data for up to five days, either at home or in the hospital.
In June, Israel-based Biobeat launched a disposable ambulatory blood pressure monitoring device that’s worn on the chest and captures cardiac health data throughout the day.
UVA Children’s Hospital in Charlottesville, Va., has been using remote patient monitoring for about seven years, but pediatric cardiologist Dr. Jeffrey Vergales expects other programs like theirs will expand due to COVID-19.
“I think we’re going to see more of an explosion of this, because the pandemic did break down a lot of antiquated rules and laws that were hard for us to navigate through and hard for us to continue to push the boundaries of,” he told MobiHealthNews in May.