From hospitals to homes, wireless health devices are changing the way in which people seek and receive medical treatment. Paul Skelton looks at a few of the key players in the digital healthcare revolution.

It is estimated that the number of patients in US hospitals alone who die from potentially preventable deaths is the equivalent of one 747 crashing every single day. Globally, this number increases exponentially.

And the two major reasons behind this number are cost and access. That’s why health technology companies are developing affordable, multi-functional devices that enable easier access to health practitioners – first at a hospital level and then later in the home.

“Studies from around the world have consistently shown that hospitalised patients in any clinical environment may suffer preventable adverse events that could result in prolonged hospitalisation, injury or death,” Sotera Wireless vice president of marketing and business development Dr Gunnar Trommer says.

Based in San Diego, California, Sotera Wireless is dedicated to developing a new generation of comprehensive vital signs monitoring devices.

“These studies have also shown the financial impact of patient safety, or lack thereof, to the healthcare system at large. Depending on the source, the US alone spends anywhere between $10-20 billion per year as a result of preventable adverse events.

“Precursors to an adverse event can be seen as early as 8-12 hours before the event actually occurs – but are often not detected. Early detection of patient deterioration is essential to intervene early enough to avoid adverse events.

“This may not have been as important even 20 years ago, but the patient population has changed considerably in that time. Patients are now older, with more co-morbidities and are having procedures, interventions and drugs that are more complex and that put these more vulnerable patients at even greater risk of deterioration.

“This situation is compounded by pressures to increase patient flow and to discharge at earlier times.”

That’s why Sotera has developed the ViSi Mobile System, which is designed to keep patients safe by continuously monitoring all vital signs and providing a constant connection between patient and clinician, allowing for more individualised and timely care.

Featuring comfortable body-worn sensors that allow for freedom of movement, the system enables continuous monitoring of all vital signs with monitoring accuracy and resolution, typically only found in Intensive Care Units (ICUs).

“Measuring all of the vital signs on one system allows the clinician to more easily correlate physiological events and trends – enabling better patient care. Each parameter is measured in a way that provides comfort and mobility to the patient while not sacrificing accuracy and resolution.”

The ViSi Mobile System is able to measure and display all core vital signs (blood pressure, heart rate/pulse rate, 3-lead or 5-lead ECG, SpO2, respiration rate, skin temperature) with monitoring accuracy and resolution, typically found in ICUs.

In addition to the colour touch screen display on the patient-worn device, desktop PCs, tablet PCs and other mobile platforms can be used as remote viewing and notification devices. ViSi Mobile is able to wirelessly transmit data, leveraging existing hospital WiFi infrastructure, and is designed to provide information output in electronic form (i.e. EMR connectivity) as well as print-outs.

“Until now, there has been no monitoring technology available that would allow keeping patients safe by means of continuously monitoring all vital signs while also allowing the patients’ freedom of movement. For the few hospitalised patients in an intensive care environment (~10% of patients), nothing goes unnoticed. But, for the majority of patients, who are not in an ICU, monitoring means vital signs snapshots every four hours or so. These patients are mobile – but they are currently not kept safe due to the lack of continuous monitoring.

“What is needed and does not exist today, is a small, robust and light instrument that monitors all vital signs continuously, wherever the patient may be. If patient deterioration occurs, the instrument needs to immediately provide a notification to the responsible clinician to enable early intervention or rapid response.”

Beyond the hospital, one of the most significant steps towards digital home healthcare in recent months was the announcement by the NFC Forum, a non-profit industry association that advances the use of Near Field Communication (NFC) technology, that it has published three specifications for the use of NFC technology in personal health devices.

Wireless health monitoring devices are being increasingly advocated by healthcare providers as a means of better managing chronic health conditions, such as heart disease and diabetes, and reducing healthcare costs. NFC technology supports these cases by making communication between health devices, computers and NFC-enabled phones fast, easy and intuitive.

The Personal Health Device Communication (PHDC) Technical Specification, for one, enables devices such as wireless blood pressure monitors, weighing scales, and glucose meters to transmit health data easily via NFC technology to external computer systems for monitoring by physicians.

“NFC is a key enabler of connected health because it provides an easy-to-use, standardised means of transmitting data from wireless home health monitoring devices to related applications on mobile phones and computers for patients and physicians,” NFC Forum Healthcare Special Interest Group chair Stephen Tiedemann says.

“Convenience and ease-of-use are essential, because people are more likely to comply with daily monitoring if it requires as little effort as possible. NFC also makes the pairing of Bluetooth and WiFi devices a very simple and fast process, thus helping other communication standards achieve better usability.

The PHDC Technical Specification provides an interoperable data transport for personal health devices conforming to the ISO/IEEE-11073-20601 Optimised Exchange Protocol and NFC Forum specifications.

Also leading the charge for home healthcare are a series of smart device apps that are receiving approval among medical professionals. In particular, the Diabetes App, which costs $6.99 from the App Store, and the HeartWise Blood Pressure Tracker ($0.99) are two such programs.

Health Informatics Society of Australia (HISA) chief executive Dr Louise Schaper wants to encourage people to think about how technology can improve healthcare and get enthusiastic about taking control of their own health.

“Mobile apps are a huge part of our lives and have the power to improve the health and wellbeing of millions of people here and around the world.”

For Gunnar, improving access to wireless health technologies in hospitals will help to facilitate future residential health technologies.

“Improving patient safety is better for the patient, better for the clinician and better for the hospital,” he says.

“The disruptive nature of the ViSi Mobile system to improve patient safety will change the standard of care and how patients in lower acuity areas in hospitals get monitored. And we believe this will happen quickly, over the next three to five years.

“The beauty of the ViSi Mobile system is that it’s designed as an expandable platform. There will be novel technologies that add parameters like non-invasive cardiac output or non-invasive pH to its capabilities, which will enable ViSi Mobile to also play in other market segments.

“Also, the ViSi Mobile system is designed to be highly interoperable. That means it can be connected to other healthcare IT systems, e.g. EMR, ADT, remote alarming, etc. by using standard, non-proprietary interfaces.

“ViSi Mobile is the right tool for clinicians at the right time to introduce disruptive change to the healthcare landscape.”

It’s clear that digital healthcare presents a significant opportunity for residential and commercial integrators alike.

It’s just a case of seizing the momentum.