Cardiac Care and The Game-Changing Impact of RPM

The American Heart Association has statistics that reveal that approximately half of Americans are suffering from some form of cardiovascular disease. Sadly, one American dies from heart disease every 36 seconds while cardiovascular disease is currently costing the United States more than $360 billion a year.
Another important topic that is on the list of agenda for healthcare providers is hypertension and Atrial fibrillation. Thus, in 2019, high blood pressure was the primary or contributing cause of death for over half a million Americans.
These statistics make it understandable why the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has been encouraging the use of new approaches to address and prevent cardiovascular illness.

Millions of Americans who are suffering from chronic cardiac diseases can live more proactively due to remote patient monitoring (RPM).

Maintaining Patient-Provider Connectivity

Remote patient monitoring or RPM is a kind of remote patient care. This remote patient care program uses linked devices to monitor the patient’s health between doctor appointments. Patients use the devices to check their blood pressure, glucose levels, weight, and other vitals daily. 

The results are automatically transferred to the provider’s software system, which allows physicians to monitor the condition of their cardiac patients without the need for regular office visits. 

It has been reported that many physicians said that RPM helps them in meeting the patient’s expectations, with 8 in 10 almost 78% of physicians reporting that they expect rising patient demand for virtual care.

To meet the need for RPM for cardiac care, approximately 84% of the physicians are presently conducting virtual visits or are planning to offer this service in the coming year.

Hypertension Management

Hypertension has a significant influence on public health and is considered the primary emphasis of the American Heart Association, which encourages anyone with high blood pressure to easily monitor it at home, and share it with their physician. 

Patients suffering from hypertension and who used optimized Healths managed RPM services experienced a decrease in systolic blood pressure by 5 points within the 3 months and within 7 months there were 7-point decreases. Clinical research reinforces the advantages of RPM for patients:

Systolic blood pressure decreases by 16.9mmHg and diastolic blood pressure drops by an average of 6.5mmHg after RPM.

In comparison to 10.4% of the normal care group, 3% of the remote care group experienced heart attacks or hospitalizations due to heart failure after 5 years.

The systolic blood pressure of 337 patients decreases by an average of 4.7 mmHg in 6 months.

Screening showed that home BP monitoring meant more instances of reducing antihypertensive medications.

Mitigating Heart Failure Risk Factors

Heart Failure is one of the most common chronic diseases in the United States, with a prevalence of 6.2 million and 5-year mortality of 42%. The 30-day heart failure hospital readmission rate is 23 percent.
If blood pressure and other early indicators are managed properly then readmissions to the hospital can be avoided.

RPM enables the physicians to take action as the blood pressure goes high. They can modify the medications and treatment before the need for hospital visits and without the need for practice visits. Additionally, weight increases due to fluid retention, a precursor to heart failure flare-ups, can be identified using connected weight scales.

Studies have shown that remote monitoring helps in lowering heart failure patients’ mortality and rates of rehospitalization. Structured telephonic support increases patient satisfaction, self-care practices, and engagement.

According to studies, doctors say that having access to more consistent data helps them in the proper treatment of patients with heart failure more successfully. The clinical research’s highlights also consist of:

Home telemonitoring can reduce mortality (risk ratio = 0.64; 95% CI: 0. Intervention group mean score was significantly higher (48-0.85) compared to usual care.

At least 80% of the daily readings were done by 70% of telemonitoring patients. Results have shown that telemonitoring increased clinical management, life quality, and self-care.

When compared to standard care, home telemonitoring interventions decreased the relative risk of hospitalizations linked to heart failure (0.64 to 0.86) and all-cause mortality (0.60 to 0.85).

Revolutionizing Cardiac Care Standards

Blood pressure monitors heart failure and hypertension and also provides pulse rate information. Irregularities in pulse rate indicate a variety of medical conditions including beta-blocker overdose, anxiety, and arrhythmias.

If pulse rate abnormalities are noticed and assessed early, it may help in the determination of changes in medication if required or if any additional testing like EKG is necessary. Additionally, it results in the early implantation of pacemakers and other therapies.

Combined with blood pressure, monitoring pulse rate can help avoid the development of Atrial Fibrillation (AFib or AF), Ventricular Fibrillation (VFib), heart failure, and strokes.

RPM improves the clinical and financial outcomes of patients and practices. It also enables healthcare practices to offer preventative care to patients outside of office visits and receive reimbursement for doing so.

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