October 13, 2005, Quebec
Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital publishes an evaluation
report on the use of Intelligent Distance Patient
Monitoring (IDPM) for chronic pulmonary diseases
On the first day
of the 6th Annual Telehealth Symposium of the
Quebec Telehealth Network, Maisonneuve-Rosemont
Hospital health professionals released an evaluation
report on the use of telehomecare for chronic
obstructive pulmonary diseases (COPD) patients.
The objectives of the pilot project were to offer
high quality of care through the rigorous clinical
monitoring of patients at home, explore new methods
of intervening at a distance using an electronic
monitoring plan, increase the number of patients
served, evaluate the impact of this new technology(IDPM)
on the organization of work, the shortage of professional
resources and the satisfaction of patients and
health care providers.
“More specifically,
we wanted to explore the possibilities of IDPM
on patients with severe COPD, evaluate the impact
on hospitalizations, home visits, telephone communications,
and the satisfaction of patients and healthcare
professionals”, mentionned Danielle St.-Jules,
head of the Regional Home Care Service for Chronic
Pulmonary Diseases of Montreal.
She adds, “Our
study documented the impact of this type of distance
monitoring of patients severely afflicted by COPD
and compared it with the best practices implemented
in the Specialized Nurse Visiting Program tailored
for COPD management. SRSAD offers this highly
specialized program and provides outstanding service
in Montreal Area to more than 2800 patients. Twenty
patients, newly enrolled in the program participated
as the experimental group and used IDPM. A precidely
matched group of ten patients using the regular
home visit program were assigned to the control
group. Project involvement and measurements lasted
for 6 months once the patients were admitted to
both programs.
The IDPM group
showed a striking decrease in the number of patients
hospitalized (89.4%) and in the number (88.3%)
as well as in the duration of all hospitalizations
(80.3%). The number of home visits required by
patients decreased by 59.8% while the length of
visits was marginally longer. The number and length
of telephone calls increased, which is consistent
with patient care received at a distance. Healthcare
professionals and patients were both highly satisfied
with the telehomecare experience. Patients also
demonstrated a greater ability than the control
group to recognize signs of deterioration in their
health condition. Above all, the at a distance
relationship was fully exploited by patients and
their healthcare professionals and it produced
the expected benefits. These results were obtained
using a generic clinical protocol that did not
fully exploited all the expertise of the SRSAD
in the management of COPD.
As envisionned
at the onset of the project by the Director General
of the hospital, Carole Deschambault, “This
initiative will ease the support of many patients
in their natural setting reassure by close monitoring
by health professionals . The clinical tool that
we are developing is part of a serv ice delivery
reorganization initiative. The support provided
by technology is invaluable in the context of
healthcare professionals shortage and will allows
us to better serve this growing clientele.”
Beyond the specialized
program already in place, the results of this
pilot project support the idea of large scale
deployment. The results also justify to put in
the needed efforts to refine the methods of intervention
for better management of COPD patients. , Furthermore,
the technology provides for empowerment of patient
regarding the self-management of COPD. The next
step will be to extent the clinical protocols
to encompass a larger spectrum of pathologies,
to include SRSAD expertise depth to monitoring
protocol and add a psychosocial dimension further
extending the reach of telehomecare.
New IT Healthcare
New IT Healthcare
is a fast-growing Montreal-based company providing
leadership in the development of flexible telehomecare
solutions used by healthcare professionals to
monitor patients requiring close supervision.
New IT Healthcare's Intelligent Distance Patient
Monitoring (IDPM) solution enables healthcare
organizations to coordinate and oversee clinical
care by creating a bi-directional and secure electronic
communication link between patients in their homes
and their team of healthcare providers. IDPM,
certified by the Quebec RTSS from the Ministry
of Health, contributes to home-based care of vulnerable
patients while optimizing human, material and
financial resources.
Maisonneuve-Rosemont
Hospital
Maisonneuve-Rosemont
Hospital is one of the biggest hospitals in Quebec
with 725 beds and 5000 employees, of whom 450
are doctors and 1500 are nurses. Its clientele
comes primarily from Montreal-East, but also from
other parts of Quebec, for the hospital’s
specialists in ophthalmology and kidney and bone
marrow transplants. The SRSAD is offered in conjunction
with other services in Montreal and serves 2800
people suffering from chronic pulmonary diseases.
Source:
New IT Healthacre
and Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital
Collette
Jobin, Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital: (514) 252-3451
Louis-Marie Boivin, New IT Healthcare: (514) 835-1069
|
