Virginia Hospital Expands RPM Program After Telehealth Pilot Success

Children’s Hospital of Richmond at Virginia Commonwealth University is expanding its remote patient monitoring program following the successful test of a telemedicine tablet that enabled care providers to keep track of their post-surgery patients at home.

A year-long study of the telehealth platform developed by Dictum Health and recently published in the Journal of Pediatric Surgery found that the tablet-based telehealth program resulted in no additional clinical visits or rehospitalizations and even prevented two probable ED visits. In addition, the program helped hospital officials discharge two patients 12 to 24 hours sooner than they would have been discharged under the normal care routine.

In addition, 92 percent of those in the study reported feeling comfortable using the connected health platform to communicate with doctors and nurses at the hospital, a critical factor in the viability of an RPM service for post-surgery patients.

“Compliance with follow-up care is critical for these patients, and many of them travel from as far as five hours away, as CHoR is the only comprehensive ACS-verified program in Virginia,” David Lanning, MD, CHoR’s co-surgeon-in-chief and interim Chief Medical Officer at the VCU Health System, said in a press release. “This telemedicine technology allows us to review their meds, discuss nutrition, view their incision site and discuss next steps – all while the patient is comfortable at home.”

Hospital officials now want to take the RPM program further.

According to officials, the next phase aims to integrate patient questionnaires and educational content into the platform, allowing care providers to customize care plans. The platform will also develop a patient score based on questionnaire responses and physiological data to help care providers keep track of potential health risks.