Telemedicine News
Launch of the Integrated Care and Telemedicine implementation program
Pharmacy Online www.apteka.ua based on the materials of Royal Philips Electronics:
EU-funded program to develop first ‘cookbook’ for coordinated care and telehealth deploymentRoyal Philips Electronics, together with its consortium partners, announced the launch of a program for the implementation of integrated care and telemedicine (Advancing Care Coordination and Telehealth Deployment – ACT).
It was developed under the leadership of Philips and will be the first in the study of organizational as well as structural processes necessary for the successful provision of integrated care and telemedicine services on a large scale. The EU-funded program brings together relevant authorities, medical institutions, universities, industrial partners and the expert community. Monitoring of integrated assistance initiatives in 5 regions of Europe will allow creating a directory combining the most advanced experience. It is expected that this initiative will help modernize the system of care for millions of patients with chronic diseases and save billions of euros annually.
Chronic diseases take on the character of a pandemic. In the EU alone, about 10 million people have been diagnosed with heart failure (Braunschweig F., Cowie M.R., Auricchio A., 2011), about 20 million have chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) (according to the European COPD Coalition) and about 60 million have diabetes mellitus (according to the International Diabetes Federation – International Diabetes Federation). Each year, the treatment of these diseases costs the health systems of the EU countries about 125 billion euros.
Integrated care and telemedicine schemes make it possible to effectively treat such patients at home using a remote management system and caregiving networks. The ultimate goal of these services is not only to improve the health of patients, but also to provide them with the opportunity to independently monitor such, which will allow them to gain greater independence. The results of clinical studies have shown that such services contribute to reducing the number of hospitalizations and bed days (a unit of measurement of inpatient care), as well as reducing the mortality rate (Inglis S.C., Cark R.A., McAlister F.A. et al., 2010; Inglis S.C., Clark R.A., McAlister F.A., Stewart S., Cleland J.G. 2011; Steventon A., Bardsley M., Billings J. et al., 2012). However, so far these have been only pilot programs due to the difficulties of conducting such research in practice.
"The ACT program is a key step towards the widespread dissemination of integrated care and telemedicine. It takes research in this area to a fundamentally new level. The program studies how to effectively implement and integrate telemedicine in order to guarantee the high quality of patient care, improve the performance of the healthcare system and ensure its economic feasibility," said Stanton Newman, professor at the School of Medical Sciences of the City University of London in the UK.
To achieve this goal, the program will unite managers in the field of healthcare, companies, universities and medical institutions. 5 European regions (the Basque Country and Catalonia in Spain, the province of Groningen in the Netherlands, Lombardy in Italy and Scotland in the UK) will develop their own telemedicine programs to combat heart failure, COPD and diabetes mellitus. The ACT system will monitor their activities for 2 years to determine the best results, principles and methods of work. The obtained data, experience and recommendations on the organization of integrated care and telemedicine systems will be published, which will allow the most promising methods to get the maximum distribution.
The program is part of the European Innovation Partnership for Active and Healthy Aging and brings together leading European healthcare professionals. This partnership is an initiative of the European Commission within the framework of the Innovation Union strategy aimed at increasing the average healthy life expectancy by 2 years by 2020.
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru30.04.2013