Tele-health-monitoring may decrease emergency room visits and hospitalisation in patients with COPD

摘要

COPD is a long-term, debilitating, respiratory condition that impacts the lives of millions of people worldwide. Poor management of COPD can lead to hospital admissions, increased healthcare costs and poorer outcomes for patients and their families. A range of interventions are used to aid self-management of this disease including technologies that remotely monitor people's physiological status at home. A person's body weight, oxygen saturation and temperature among others can be measured using digital devices and the information sent to healthcare providers who can provide feedback and respond to any deteriorating symptoms. Several systematic reviews of the evidence on the effectiveness of tele-monitoring for patients with COPD exist. However, they have reported conflicting outcomes, used mixed interventions where the results of the tele-monitoring element were not clear or they lacked subgroup analysis.